Batman and Superman's latest and greatest enemy is going viral.
There is an eerie echo of Ebola — but writ larger-than-life for the comic-book medium — with the dangerous outbreak occurring in the four-part "The Amazo Virus" story line kicking off Wednesday in DC Comics' Justice LeagueNo. 36.
A new disease infects the book alongside a new artist, Jason Fabok, who joins writer Geoff Johns as the current arc leads into next year's "The Darkseid War" and other big stories in store.
"It's really hard to find someone who can do a book like Justice League because you have to be good at drawing everybody; Wonder Woman, Batman, the villains, an empty Metropolis," says Johns.
Adds Fabok: "I want to give something to the fans where they're really going to want to dig into the background and look at all the detail in there."
The first version of Flash that Fabok, best known for Batman Eternal and other Dark Knight works, draws in Justice League is actually lying on a bed surrounded by some of his ailing pals.
Originating from the labs of Lex Luthor's Lexcorp, the Amazo Virus has inadvertently been unleashed in Metropolis, and one day later the place looks like an apocalypse has blown through town and those infected show extraordinary abilities before dying.
The situation is only going to get worse as the Amazo Virus continues to evolve, the secrets behind its creation come out and Lex Luthor, who's wormed his way onto the Justice League, is targeted by deadly assassins.
Johns came up with the story months ago, with the current Ebola scare beginning around the time the new issue was going to press.
The writer's idea was to explore what would happen if not only superheroes, supervillains and other metahumans were not the only life forms on Earth that have moved to the next stage of their development. What if a virus suddenly could survive indefinitely outside of a human body and acted as if it almost had a mind of its own?
"Really, it was about the Justice League being unprepared to fight a villain they can't talk to or face or be rational with," Johns says. "There's nothing to do — this is what a virus does and it mutates and grows throughout the arc, and we see how dangerous something like this could be.
"If a man can fly and is invulnerable, if that's scary, what does a virus that can't be stopped going to do?"
The Justice League will have to rely on Luthor to help stop this mess, not to mention the way the Man of Steel's longtime foe has already galvanized the group with his presence.
"Every member has a different viewpoint of Luthor," Johns says. "Someone like Shazam doesn't have the experience — he's like, 'What's the big deal?' He is somewhat naïve and not entirely informed, while Superman every step of the way is questioning it."
Batman and Luthor have been at odds as their dynamic has become one of the focal points of Justice League, and while the former bad guy constantly feels like Wonder Woman is judging him, she's actually the one hero willing to give him a chance to redeem himself.
"He's going to soon realize that she is a potential ally in a bizarre way," Johns says of Luthor. "Even after all the things he's done, she's still willing to say there's good in this guy and he'll do the right thing. But she'll have her hand on her lasso the whole time to make sure that happens."
Luthor's strived to save his sister during this disaster, and she personifies a vulnerability he has — the writer teases that the series will dig into more of their relationship. Plus, he's feeling guilty about the Amazo Virus on many different levels, "but never forget he's incredibly narcissistic: His other thought is, 'This is going to come back on me.'
"He's struggling with a lot of things and one of them definitely is, 'This is my fault.' "
The villain and his armored outfit has been one of Fabok's favorite things to draw in hisJustice League run, but he's also enjoyed designing Batman's new hazmat suit. He had previously hatched one for him in a Detective Comics story involving Clayface but wanted to do something decidedly different.
"It's flexible, he can move around, he can jump and do whatever he needs to do but he is vulnerable as a human" in his "haz-Bat" ensemble, Fabok says. "We're going to have some fun with that later on."
Adds Johns: "He's risking his life in there and we'll see the camaraderie between Batman and Superman grow."
For the opening pages that show a devastated Metropolis, Fabok explains that he pulled from his experience playing the zombie video game The Last of Us and used a similar visual look and feel to create a scary and eerie version of "this super ultra-futuristic shiny bright city."
Wanting to perfect his takes on these A-list characters and see where Johns takes them in the storytelling inspired him to create "this really different-looking first issue where you're going to pick it up and go, 'What the heck happened to Metropolis?' " Fabok says. "It is kind of creepy. From there, it's just going to keep evolving into something bigger and bigger and darker."
