Justice League of America #40 is an issue of the series Justice League of America (Volume 1) with a cover date of November, 1965.
Synopsis for "Indestructible Creatures of Nightmare Island!"
Andrew Helm, the last survivor of a peaceful society that was destroyed by superstitious outsiders has invested all his time to creating the Corti-Concious Machine, a device that channels the goodness of histories greatest humanitarians and imposes it on the entire population of the Earth. Using an astral projection ability learned from the monks of Ta Ming, Helm travels the world to see the impact of his invention.
This happens as the Flash is battling Mirror Master and the Shark, and Batman is battling the Penguin and Captain Cold. During both heroes fights, they are shocked to find their opponents suddenly go from being evil to being good. Traveling to JLA headquarters, the JLA members are shocked to learn that all over the world every human being is ending conflict and turning to peace.
Helm's achieved world peace is only short lived however when his machine malfunctions and suddenly the world erupts into total chaos and violence. Having been out of his physical body too long, Helm finds that he is trapped and cannot shut down the device. However, he manages to get the Justice League to go to his island base and fight off the nightmare generated devices in order to shut the machine down. With the device deactivated and the planet restored to relative peace, Green Lantern seals the island in a dome and the JLA return home wondering who built the device to begin with.
Appearing in "Indestructible Creatures of Nightmare Island!"
Featured Characters:
Supporting Characters:
Antagonists:
- Chung Ka
- Mirror Master
- The Shark
- Captain Cold
- Penguin
- Unnamed Caribbean ditactor(See Notes)
- A magincian
- A fire creature
- A stegosaurus
- Giant crab
- Animated marble gladiator
- A dryad
- Whirling sand-being
- Gigant bird of prey
Other Characters:
- Budda (Flashback only)
- Chandra Gopar
- Confucius (Flashback only)
- Jesus Christ (Flashback only)
- Mohammed (Flashback only)
- Moses (Flashback only)
- United Nations (Mentioned only)
Locations:
Items:
- Corti-Conscience Machine
- Captain Cold's Cold Gun
- Penguin's Umbrella
- Batcape
- Green Lantern Ring
Vehicles:
Notes
- This issue contains a picture of Muhammad, which is generally prohibited by Islam.
- This issue is reprinted in Justice League of America Archives Volume 5.
- A shortened version of the story is reprinted in Justice League of America #140.
- Fidel Castro is not fully shown nor named, but we can see his beard and moreover, Cuba is the only Caribbean Island with nuclear missiles. This issue was published circa 3 years after the Cuban Missile Crisis.
Trivia
- The story shows a place where some citizens can't vote. It may be the southern United States, where its policies about voting excluded illiterates, African-Americans and foreigners until 1965.
- The stegosaur is depicted errouneously. Stegosaurs hadn't horns.
See Also
- Cover gallery for the Justice League of America series
- Images from Justice League of America Vol 1 40
Recommended Reading
- Justice League Recommended Reading
- Justice League of America (Volume 1)
- Justice League of America (Volume 2)
- Justice League of America (Volume 3)
- Justice League of America (Volume 4)
- Justice League of America (Volume 5)
- JLA (Volume 1)
- Justice League (Volume 1)
- Justice League (Volume 2)
- Justice League (Volume 3)
- Justice League (Volume 4)
- Justice League International (Volume 1)
- Justice League International (Volume 2)
- Justice League International (Volume 3)
- Justice League Europe (Volume 1)
- Justice League America (Volume 1)
- Justice League Task Force (Volume 1)
- Justice League Quarterly (Volume 1)
- Justice League Dark (Volume 1)
- Justice League Dark (Volume 2)
- Extreme Justice (Volume 1)
- Justice League Elite (Volume 1)
- Justice League Odyssey (Volume 1)