or "What happened to the garbage?"
That's my title, not Giffen's. The first five pages of this issue are a copy of the article written for SPY by the reporter who was snatching the JLA trash in previous issues. And, boy, did he find trash!
He outs Ted as the Blue Beetle (insulting his name at the same time). He reveals that Oberon is, probably, stealing letters from Barda to Scott. Poor Guy was probably in a sanatarium for seven years. He uncovered Fire's identity as Beatriz (from peroxide and green dye bottles!) and nothing on Ice. And Booster Gold missed out on winning Publisher's Clearinghouse prizes.
And then we find out that it isn't even printed in the magazine. The publisher pulls the piece! Who is responsible? The "European Distributor," who just happens to be Crimson Fox of Justice League Europe. Oops.
Then we flash back to the guy I thought looked like a red Martian. But, in fact, it is actually Despero? He goes after Steel (not familiar to me Steel...), and when Despero finds him dead, he kills every one else in the lab. But Despero will find the JLA and KILL THEM (and we see a gas station where gas is $0.91 a gallon. Remember that?).
So, Despero is going after old members of the JLA. Steel first, then Gypsy. JLA gets an alert when Despero starts taking out Gypsy's whole town, after killing her Mom and Dad. J'onn makes it just in time to stop Despero from killing Gypsy. Oh, boy. Action packed issue! The writers could really pack story into a single issue back then.
Sigh....
And a couple comments... What is wrong with Mr. Miracle? And is Booster forming another super hero team?