Justice League of America #42

Here's a 1966 DC gem that poses one of the more unexpected questions of the Silver Age: what happens when the Justice League extends a membership invitation and gets a flat refusal? The cover by Mike Sekowsky and Murphy Anderson lays out the drama vividly — Metamorpho battles menaces solo across two dynamic panels, firing off blasts and deflecting threats while Superman, Green Lantern, Batman, and the Flash press in around him, his defiant speech bubbles making his independence unmistakably clear. Gardner Fox's story promises a hero confident enough to turn down Earth's greatest team, and that tension alone makes this issue hard to set down.