Justice League of America #116-117. March-April, 1975.
By Cary Bates, Elliot S. Maggin, Dick Dillin, Dick Giordano and Frank McLaughlin.
Answering the Justice League mail, Green Arrow investigates a letter from an orphaned teenager, who claims to have powers like those of his idol, Hawkman, and to have become a crime fighter in Midway City.
GA arrives in Midway City just in time to help young Charley Parker, alias Golden Eagle, escape a trap set by Hawkman's old enemy, the Matter Master, who has mistaken the youth for the real Winged Wonder. Batman, Elongated Man, Flash, and Aquaman join Green Arrow to battle a series of threats unleashed by the Matter Master's Meniachem wand, while Golden Eagle finds himself transported to the villain's hideway, where the Matter Master sits in a state like suspended animation while causing his wand to engage the Justice League heroes.
Awakening to the realization that Golden Eagle is not the real Hawkman at all, and that his wand is responsible for Charley's acquiring super-powers (in unconscious anticipation of the villain's wish to battle and defeat a hero resembling Hawkman), the Matter Master is about to destroy Golden Eagle when the JLA intervenes and defeats him. As the case is closed and Parker returned to normal, the real Hawkman unexpectedly returns.
Several Justice League members are ambushed by a space attacker who resembles Katar Hol (Hawkman), and find their super-powers scrambled as a result: the Atom is increasing in size, Batman is flying, etc. The Hawkman who had apparently returned earlier[1] proves to be a mere message-image from the real Hawkman, but before the heroes can investigate further, they must overcome their altered-abilities handicap.
Their attacker, who actually is Hawkman, has been the victim of a plague initiated by a space villain called the Equalizer—a plague which has caused all of Thanagar to become "average", with each person exactly equal in power and ability to every other. Hawkman has infected the JLA members with the disease so that each has only a portion of the combined total powers of all the members, and by so doing has managed to absorb a fraction of their powers for himself in order to battle the Equalizer.
My guess is this is a swipe of Neal Adams...
The heroes drive off the Equalizer by combining all of their will and negative emotions into it and overwhelming it. They cure themselves and Hawkman of the disease, and Hawkman resumes his relationship until such time as the rest of Thanagar (including Hawkgirl) can be cured, and he can return home.
Golden Eagle some day will look cool, but he didn’t during the seventies. (He would later be part of the Titans West, for a few months).
So Hawkman is back in one of the most boring stories of 1975. Yeay!
I really miss Len Wein at this point. Cary Bates’ story wasn’t boring, but it lacked a good climax.
I give these stories a score of 6.75.
