Study Hall of Justice (DC Comics: Secret Hero Society Series #1)

by Derek Fridolfs, Dustin Nguyen (Illustrator)

Overview

The team behind DC Comics LIL' GOTHAM takes readers to the halls of Ducard Academy in Gotham City, where a young Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman start their very own Junior Detective Agency!

Young Bruce Wayne is the new kid at Ducard Academy, a prep school for gifted middle school students. Bruce finds out pretty quickly that he doesn't fit in: the faculty seems to not just encourage villainous behavior from its students, but reward it. He makes friends with two other outsiders, farm boy Clark Kent and the regal Diana Prince. The three band together to form a detective squad to find out why all of these extraordinary kids have been brought together at Ducard Academy, and to see just what the faculty is plotting. An all-new series from the Eisner-nominated team behind Batman Lil' Gotham (Dustin Nguyen and Derek Fridolfs), Secret Hero Society uses comics, journal entries, and doodles to reimagine Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman as three students in the same school. They'll try their best to solve their case, but just because you're faster than a speeding bullet, more powerful than a locomotive, or an Amazonian princess, it doesn't mean you get to stay up past eleven.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780545825016
Publisher:	Scholastic, Inc.
Publication date:	01/26/2016
Series:	DC Comics: Secret Hero Society Series , #1
Pages:	176
Sales rank:	404,139
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.40(h) x 0.80(d)
Lexile:	560L (what's this?)
Age Range:	8 - 12 Years

About the Author

Derek Fridolfs is a New York Times bestselling author. With Dustin Nguyen, he cowrote the Eisner-nominated Batman: Li'l Gotham. He's also written and worked on such comics series as Batman: Arkham City Endgame with Paul Dini, Detective Comics, Legends of the Dark Knight, Adventures of Superman, Sensation Comics Featuring Wonder Woman, Catwoman, Zatanna, JLA, Justice League Beyond, and comics based on the cartoons for Adventure Time, Regular Show, Clarence, Pig Goat Banana Cricket, Dexter's Laboratory, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Teen Titans Go, Looney Tunes, and Scooby-Doo Where Are You! He's written several chapter books for Capstone based on the Justice League.
Dustin Nguyen is a New York Times bestselling and Eisner Award-winning American comics creator. His body of work includes Batman: Li'l Gotham, which he cocreated, and numerous DC, Marvel, Dark Horse, and Boom! titles along with DC Comics Secret Hero Society and Image Comics' Descender and Ascender, both of which he cocreated. He lives in California with his wife, Nicole; their two kids, Bradley and Kaeli; and dog, Max. His first children's picture book, titled What Is It?, was written by his wife (at the age of 10) and is their first collaboration together. He enjoys sleeping and driving.

Editorial Reviews

02/01/2016
Gr 3–5—Aspiring young detective Bruce Wayne has been recruited for Ducard Academy and soon realizes that something fishy is going on. His fellow classmates are a bunch of clowns and bullies who have no desire to better their formal education; they are more interested in petty crimes and world domination. Luckily, Bruce finds two classmates who similarly are not fitting in at the Academy. Clark is a strange boy from a farm in Smallville. Diana Prince comes from a small exotic island on the other side of the world. If the three of them can work together, they might be able to figure out who is really running Ducard Academy and why the curriculum is so bizarre. They just have to watch out for the school's vigilant central computer system/librarian and the ninjas who always seem to be in the shadows. This graphic novel hybrid will likely find an engaged audience with young Marvel superhero fans who, perhaps, are not quite ready for more involved comics. Die-hard fans, however, will have trouble reconciling this alternate history with the traditional backstories of the famous grown-up superheroes they have come to know. Reluctant readers will appreciate the spare text, graphic novel panels, and varied ephemera including chat scripts, school evaluation reports, maps, and emails. Though jam-packed with visual and text elements, the story is easy to follow. VERDICT A supplemental purchase for collections in need of high-interest hybrid format titles.—Carol Hirsche, Barnett Elementary, Payson, UT

School Library Journal

2015-11-11
Young students with oddly familiar names team up to investigate the nefarious agenda of their school's administration in this batty series opener. In fact, hardly has Bruce Wayne hung a couple of bats in his new locker at Gotham City's exclusive Ducard Academy than glimpses of lurking ninjas, an encounter with cream-pie-bearing bully Joe Kerr, and other signs raise his suspicion that something's not right. With plenty of help from exchange student Diana Prince and hayseed classmate Clark Kent, he does indeed expose a scheme to recruit young villains—explained in detail by principal Ra's Al Ghul—before he escapes in the wake of a climactic ninja battle. Along the way Bruce and company try out for extracurricular activities ("Boys' sports: All pain, some gain! To sign up, see Coach Zod"), attend classes taught by the likes of Alice in Wonderland-obsessed Jervis Tetch, and adopt distinctive Halloween costumes for the climactic dust-up. Spun out in a mix of journal entries, chat transcripts, screenshots, and panels of comic art as loose as the plotline, the tale hurtles its inconclusive way to a close that leaves Bruce looking forward to the bats, shadows, and mysteries of summer camp. Stay tuned. Not much more than a vehicle created to spotlight middle school versions of DC Comics heroes and baddies, but fans, at least, will enjoy catching the references. (Graphic fantasy. 9-11)

Kirkus Reviews