Legion World Forums LEGION CLUBHOUSE The Legion of Super-Heroes I'm a bit late to the party: ThreeBoot Legion thoughts and questions:

I was actually a bit scared to try this series due to the…lack of glowing reviews I’d heard concerning it. So it took me a while to get around to buying them, much less actually trying to read through the first story-arc. Just for clarification, I’ve only read issues 1-16 so far, so my opinion is based entirely on those.

I…think I like it? But, as with most things, there’s a catch to that. This does not feel like “Legion” to me. So, the more I began enjoying the issues, the more I started feeling as though I was reading an entirely different series altogether. These first 16 issues are surprisingly well crafted, the storyline engaging and somewhat unique…but it just doesn’t “feel” quite right.

The characters I’ve come to love just don’t seem quite like themselves and I’m not 100% sure how to put my finger on what exactly makes them “off”. Granted, there are some characters that I really enjoyed. Shrinking Violet/Atom Girl is a hoot, Brainiac 5 is sort of refreshing redesigned, Dream Girl is charmingly unique, and Ultra Boy is someone I’d like to get a beer with. But some characters like Cosmic Boy, Chameleon, and Invisible Kid seem strangely removed from their previous incarnations. So much so that they don’t seem like the same characters at all. I’m not saying I don’t enjoy a bit of reinvention, but when I’m literally pretending I’m reading a different series than what’s on the cover…that’s not quite right.

There’s plenty of good here. The art is great these first 16 issues, with costume designs that I enjoyed and found eye-appealing. The Big Baddie, Praetor Lemnos, has one of the most quirky, interesting “superpowers” I’ve seen in a long while. The suspense levels were great, leaving me excited to open the next issue. The Orwellian feel, while nothing new, is done in a way that isn’t too off-putting, though I’ve heard that it fades over the course of the series. There’s lots of good, clever things to be said for this series so far.

But…it just doesn’t feel like Legion.

I wasn’t around for the original discussions of this series, so I’d be curious to hear your guys’ opinions on it? Did you like it at the time? Did you hate it? Were you neutral? What did you like/dislike? I’m really curious about how you all felt at the time this was originally introduced.

[EDIT] I've finished the series at this point and...WOW DOES THE WRITING GET BAD. What happened that last year? Did they just decide to screw all good storytellng and coherent plots in favor of utter nonsense?

Not good, my friends...not good.

I haven't read them since they came out, but my memory is that the series started out pretty strong in the first few issues, but then started developing problems, like a lot of the action seemed to be happening off-screen, and the not-bothering-to-name-villains tendency, which annoyed me after awhile. There are definitely a lot of really cool concepts in the series, though.

I also loved the first 5-6 issues and then it just bogged down. Conjure Lass may have a unique perspective as she's reading it in one sitting, but reading as a monthly was painful as the plot just drug on issue after issue. The concept was novel at first, but then became more of a drag on the story than a help. The villains were bland, and the destruction of Orando seemed like a throwaway (I'll give Shooter credit for at least dealing with that).

I liked most of the characters at first, but felt Supergirl really threw the whole dynamic off, and after a while they just stagnated. Shooter then came in and butchered the characters completely. Ultra Boy was pretty repugnant under him.

I can see how reading it as a monthly would have been a bit of a slog right around issues 6-9 or so. Nothing of major important really happened, and they seemed like filler issues at times. You might be right about my having a different perspective on it due to being able to read it in one sitting.

And it's funny that you should mention Supergirl coming in and sort of ruining the dynamic. That was the exact reason why I stopped reading for a few days. It came out of nowhere and Supergirl's "you're a dream" is...pretty ridiculous. I'm going to keep going, because I bought them all, but I can already see the failings that others are talking about budding up.

The premise of "eat it grandpa" or a strange new take on the antiseptic future was never really explored. It was introduced ... and then it turned into a mega super hero fights super villain rumble book.

I thought "Super girl and the Legion of Super Heroes" was a cute idea. Although I don't think there was any sort of story related to it ... or wasn't memorable ... as I don't remember anything about it besides the change in logo.

I like it a lot better now, compared to most of what has come since.

Sad, but true. I surprised myself with how much more I was enjoying this older boot than anything that's going on right now. The current series could, in my opinion, take a lesson from the beginnings of Threeboot and the DnA run of Reboot.

Yeah, i'm not 100% sure what the point of bringing Supergirl into the mix is. I'm under the impression that there will be some sort of battle with the Dominators at some point? Does anyone know what the thought process was behind bringing Supergirl into the Legion at the time this was published? Were sales slumping? Was Supergirl in "limbo" without her own series?

I discovered Legion at the time of the Threeboot so I was excited because it meant I could jump into the series without having to worry too much about canon. I was also a big fan of Waid from his run on the Fantastic Four. I really liked this run because, even though the premise may not be original, it gives the Legion a sense of purpose that I find lacking in other incarnations of the series. A "utopia" that has been at peace for so long and thus unable to deal with a situation they created (by using one planet as their prison).

I like the relationship between Nura/Querl far better than Kara/Querl because it is more realistic. I have known more than one relationship that fell apart because one of the party studied abroad.

Conjure, I strongly suggest reading Waid's Fantastic Four run, it might explain more about his writing style and characterization in Legion. When I think about it, Brainiac 5 is very similar to Mr. Fantastic.

As I recall, Waid wanted to use Superboy (as in "Clark Kent when he was a teen") but there was no way editorial would let him do so at the time, so he jumped at the chance when they offered him Supergirl. It was awhile before we found out how Supergirl's appearance in the Legion connected to anything that was going on in her present series.

Also, Sales were on the slide (quite dramatically) and Supergirl, at the time, was doing MASSIVE sales, so it seemed like a win-win. But then Supergirl went into abysmal free-fall shortly after this (thanks mostly to a poor handling of OYL in that book) and fans were really confused as there was no real connection between the Legion appearance and the actual Supergirl book. The whole thing was eventually revealed as part of the 52/One Year Later stuff, but not really to anyone's satisfaction, and long after readers had abandoned both books in droves.

So...wait. Supergirl was in both books, but there was no explanation as to how the two different series' interconnected?! No wonder fans were confused! I would have probably dropped both of them myself due to not understanding what was going on.

Is there a one-sentence explanation for Supergirl's appearances in the threeboot that anyone would care to post? I think I had read about it at the time but can't remember what it was.

I don't recall how Supergirl got the the future. The only scene I really liked with her was when the Science Police officer was all enchanted and asked for her autograph - SPs detesting all the other legionnaires. That was charming. It could have been cute to have Lyle have a big crush on her, but then it got all weirdo-stalker obsession.

There was a lot to like about the 3boot, particularly at the beginning. The Brainy-Nura romance, the goats in the lab, Valley Girl Projectra, spacey Element Lad, black Star Boy, speechless Saturn Girl, the mysterious villain Lemnos, Gazelle. It was a very different United Planets from what had gone before.

The bickering between Legionnaires was annoying, though; Brainy was a jerk. The destruction of Orando went pretty much without consequence and the perpetrators (Terror Firma) weren't punished.

Shooter brought some energy to the series and some interesting storylines (although I didn't like his Projectra) but his sudden enforced departure led to that wretched final issue.

Personally, I stopped following it when Projectra ... The story took on a foosball like quality.

I wish I had followed Manapaul's art more but I just didn't like the introduction of the new characters who seemed to be second tier and more about some creative exploration than creating lasting characters. I did like the Lightning Lord story and art towards the end of the series, when Matter Eater Lad shows up. I didn't manage to get them all though.

That Supergirl story was just wacky though.

Wherein I ramble on about the Threeboot;

There were a lot of changes that seemed to be 'for changes sake,' and quite a few of them I didn't care for.

Brainy was Vril Dox 2.0, an uber-jerk. As a smart person, who is at least minimally capable of making friends and influencing people without saying nasty douchy things every 10 seconds like I have some sort of elitist Tourettes, I find 'stupid-smart' characters who are clueless and socially incompetent and make their own lives more difficult (and lonely!) every time they open their mouths to be an annoying stereotype.

Dreamy, on the other hand, was amazingly cool. I loved that she could use her powers while awake, since the 'classic' Dreamy was always a bit of dead weight (and, in the Silver Age, was often wrong in her interpretations of her predictions, to boot!). The 'dreamy' 'sleepwalker' distracted characterization was also very cool, taking from the Reboot Dreamy (who had trained herself to be in a half-dreaming state) and following through on it characterization-wise, making it seem like an even better-realized version of both Classic and Reboot Dreamy. Plus the introduction to Naltor, with the 'Pre-Cops,' was awesome. Before the Shooterboot and the lush portrayal of Triton, the visit to Naltor and the focus on Dream Girl (issue 3?), was my favorite 'Legion World' of the Threeboot.

The changes to Colossal Boy / Micro Lad kind of went both ways for me. On the one hand, if anyone could use a little spicing up, it was him. On the other hand, the 'Bizarro Brainiac' concept and 'Big City' seemed to take away from his unique status and make him into yet another of the 'I come from a planet of people who can X,' which is already the default Legion origin, it seems. I'm on the fence about him. As happened quite a bit in the Threeboot, Waid seemed to change his mind. Colossal Boy was original described as having the unique ability to shrink to six feet in height, and then, a year or so later, we meet another resident of 'Big City' who can also change her size, and it's not even commented on as being unusual, suggesting that Waid had forgotten that Gim was supposed to be unique and had just assumed that all members of Big City could shrink to normal size (which begs the question of why Big City would even still exist!).

I felt like there was a real story intended about the changes to Projectra, that her 'illusion powers' had something to do with her having the spiritual / psychic remnants of her entire world rattling around in her skull, allowing her to overpower the psyches of others and 'impose her own reality' on them, somehow, using the combined willpower of the thousands of souls within her to overwhelm the perceptions of others, making it very much not just 'create illusions.' And... nothing came of it. Huge dropped plot thread, which annoyed me mightily.

Her characterization was unique as well. On a team of people with, quite often, sketchy and 'un-heroic' motivations to join this 'Legion of Super-Heroes,' pre-powered-Projectra came off as very genuine in her desire to be a hero, and not just 'Princess Moneybags' locked away in her ivory tower and only called upon when it was time to cut a check. It was a very interesting scenario, with the 'spoiled brat pampered princess' perhaps having one of the more 'heroic' and sympathetic presentations (compard to some of the other Legionnaires, who came off as a bit too political or opportunistic or 'along for the ride'), and, unfortunately, also got short shrift.

I like the Threeboot Brin Londo, because he was *very much* 'not-Wolverine.' With a dynamic acrobatic fighting style, like Spider-Man or Nightcrawler or Nightwing, very unlike the clawed canucklehead, and no hint of claws or fangs or feral behavior, he was more like the classic Silver Age Timber Wolf, who was always my favorite. His not being a Legionnaire (at first) and his refusal to wear a costume or use a superhero codename, all called back nicely to his 'Lone Wolf' phase, when he wasn't a team player.

Atom Girl, with her guns and her sass and 'building up her legend,' was cool. The connection between the Imskians and Brainy, and the suggestion that many Imskians regarded Brainy as a savior figure (for freeing them from servitude to the Coluans?) was very intriguing.

Star Boy, an alien with an alien metabolism (called out by his inability to process sugars), who happened to look like an Earth-human of African descent struck me as terrible 'casting.' It's kind of tacky to make the 'black guy' not even human, and therefore not *really* a 'black guy.' 'We don't need a black Legionnaire, 'cause they have an alien who *looks* black!' Loved his new costume 'though. (The costumes were hit and miss for me. I loved Projectra's new look. Dreamy's new look was also cool. Sun Boy's new look was terrible, IMO, on the other hand.)

I kind of liked Element Lad's new look and characterization, despite it being nothing at all like 'my Jan.' His powers were hugely downgraded. Trom was not only still a thriving world, but had apparently destroyed Daxam in a genocidal war! (Which was a tad odd, since the first issue mentioned something about Daxam voting whether or not to remain in the U.P. Does someone else live there now that all the Daxamites are dead? Trommite settlers, perhaps?) I kind of liked his pretentious goatee-ed New Age-y 'spiritual' character,

Threeboot Lyle Norg kinda sucked. I didn't think too much of Classic Lyle, but gained a huge new appreciation for him in the Reboot and in Superboy's Legion, both of whom made him a very competent and likable figure. I was excited to see him alive at the beginning, but then quickly grew to dislike him. It's easier for me to tolerate 'bad versions' of characters that are still alive, somewhere, as the 'original' can show back up and redeem the name, as it were. But a crappy version of someone who is dead, like Lyle, just leaves that impression around, without appearances by the original being able to remind people that he's not really a creep. Threeboot Lyle, IMO, was very much 'speaking ill of the dead.'

Loved mute Saturn Girl with her messy hair, at least until Shooter messed with her. Enjoyed that version of Lightning Lad, somewhat, and the lightning on his costume was an interesting visual. The casual and offhand way in which Light Lass was said to have been with other teammates was interesting, in that there seemed to be no approbrium about that sort of thing, which helped alleviate any sort of parochial 'slut-shaming' that might have crept into the storyline. Chameleon being genderless and 'not attracted to fixed-form sentients' was intriguing, but him/her/it acting like a petulant brat was annoying, and the nature of hir powers seemed to change all the time. Shadow Lass had that last problem as well. Most of the time, she was 'Lights Out Lass,' creating only darkness, but she was shown at one point blocking a blast from someone else (Lightning Lad or Sun Boy, I don't remember which) and later in a mass combat with Lemnos' army hitting someone with a darkness blast in the gut that's causing them to double over and be knocked back, which seems more like the sort of 'darkforce' stuff that Reboot Umbra or Superboy's Legion Shadow Lass could do.

I liked seeing Karate Kid again, but then didn't much care for this characterization. Again, having him be kind of arrogant and not at all spiritual (not even 'faux spiritual,' like Threeboot Jan), felt to me a little bit like 'speaking ill of the dead.' The scene where he shows Ultra Boy how to use his powers or something was lame. I like that a trained martial artist can do some impressive stuff, but demolishing a million tons of ice is a bit over the top.

Ultra Boy was pretty much ulra-dumb ultra-jock, which is a characterization I don't much care for. I'd rather he be street smart, if nothing else, and perhaps have a more practical, less idealistic 'get 'er done' results-based mindset. On the other hand, on a team lacking some of the traditional 'heavy hitters' like Superboy, Mon-El and Wildfire, he perhaps was a victim of circumstance, not having to work as hard to 'keep up' on a team where *everybody* has only the one power, and can't switch to a bunch of other powers willy-nilly. Perhaps being teamed with people who have all his powers, all the time, and generally hugely outclass him (one of them, Mon-El, being his best friend), has made 'Classic' Jo more level-headed and less of a buffoon?

Phantom Girl's power changes made no sense. She steps into Bgtzl rather than phasing to go around obstacles? What if there's something there in Bgtzl, like a wall, or a mountain, or a person? Does that mean she can't phase, because there just happens to be something there in both universes? That was, IMO, a very ill-conceived change. It would also mean that she has to regularly 'phase' to become solid in the UP universe, *to go around an obstacle in Bgtzl.* Meh. Interesting idea, poorly thought out.

Triplicate Girl felt like another abandoned plot thread. What happened on Cargg? We'll never know.

The main villain having the power to be forgettable felt a bit 'meta' since he, and all of his flunkies (some of whom remain nameless!) are indeed, forgettable. Terror Firma came off as as less interesting version of the Masters of Disaster (from the old Batman & the Outsiders book), and that's pretty sad. What's next, Praetor Lemnos, a 30th century version of the Force of July or Strike Force Kobra?

I always thought that Terra Firma was a nod to Waid's run on the Fantastic Four, because most of their members have element based powers. Elysion remains one of my favorite Legion villains to this day.

I love the Greek-inspired names of Terror Firma.

Theena is also one of my favorite additions of the threeboot.

You rant like a champ.

I cannot even tell you how much I enjoyed Atom Girl's characterization so far in the Threeboot. She is very fun to read! I was sort of 'meh' about Salu in the Reboot (mostly due to her 'meh' characterization until almost the end of the series) and genuinely don't like the current version of her as I find her to be very abrasive(unlike the Threeboot Salu who was sassy and confident but not to the point of being intolerable).

I am with you 100% on Lyle. I never read the original Legion, but Reboot Lyle was my absolute favorite character. He was smart, capable, likable, a bit of a smartass, and despite his being a spy still came across as very trustworthy. THREEBOOT LYLE WAS NONE OF THESE THINGS. He was one of the characters that I kept thinking was just someone else entirely. He was, bluntly, a brat. He came across as spoiled and whiny and completely untrustworthy. Nothing like the Lyle Norg I had come to love in the Reboot. And, like i've said, i'm not averted to a little reinvention...but this made a very good character into someone very unlikable.

I hadn't really thought about Brainiac that way, but you're right. I think my favorite characterization of him was probably during Legion Lost and The Legion during the Reboot era. He was a bit prickly (as his character always has been) but had so much more personality than just insulting everyone all the time.

Legion Lost Brainy is my favorite Brainy or one of.

He seemed like he was marching to a different drum than everyone else.

BUUUUT, I think Brainy being SO much smarter than everyone would drive him mad ... a 12th level intellect is so far past a human ... it would be like hanging out with dogs or 2 year olds all the time ... if that! (maybe more like circus ants) I love dogs and two year olds but even the nicest person would feel isolated and like they were getting dumber and dumber.

The Peter David interpretation of Quicksilver, being trapped in line forever behind the world's slowest shopper, seems even better suited to Brainy. His brain, depending on how 'effector intelligence' is treated, operates a hundred thousand times faster than a humans (perhaps even a million or more times faster!).

There are times, being a mere mortal, that I'm talking to someone, and I can already tell where the conversation is going (having already heard this story, at a family gathering, for instance) and I'm, in my head, thinking 'get on with it.' For Brainy, he should have every other Legionnaire already 'mapped out in his head,' so that, by the first word of any sentence they utter, he's already mapped out a dialogue tree of the most probably followup words and sentences, and anticipated his own reply, and their reply to his reply, and anyone else's contributions, so that *any* conversation with his teammates should be mind-numbingly boring, if he bothers to devote all of his brain to it. (Kind of like in the first Terminator movie, where a list of appropriate responses pop up to the landlord, and the Terminator chooses the one that he predicts will make the man go away and never speak to him again.)

But, just like us mere mortals, smiling through a story we've heard from Uncle Mark a million times, while doing other stuff in our head (or on our phone, or whatever), Brainy should *easily* be able to multi-task, and devote like 1% or less of his brain to engaging in conversation, while the other 99% is doing twelth-dimensional geometry, curing Carggite triplicative cancer, figuring out Gil'Dishpan engineering or reviewing the latest Durlan tentacle-porn he downloaded last week or something.

That Brainy *chooses* to act like an impatient twit, instead of running a sub-routine to deal with social interactions, which would take 1/10th of 1% of his brainpower and cost him literally nothing (and save him, and his teammates, tons of aggravation and wasted time re-explaining stuff!) just means that Brainy *wants* to be a ginormous jerkwad.

And that makes no sense to me.

If he *really* dislikes discussions with lower level intellects, he shouldn't deliberately prolong them by inefficiently communicating, and it's not like he has to devote any more than an insignificant percentage of his brain to such interactions anyway, so it's literally *impossible* for such things to 'distract' him in any meaningful way.

It's just a huge pet peeve of mine that 'smart' people in comics are so consistently portrayed as absent-minded or distracted or socially clueless. That's not smart, that's 'idiot savant' or 'Rain Man.'

Hell (not to toot my own horn here) but I'm pretty smart and sometimes I feel like I'm surrounded by children at work. Thank god for Legion World where I don't feel that way at all. XD

And yeah, there was something very...interesting about Brainy's character in Legion Lost. It was like there was a reinvention of characterization and purpose for him. It was such a breath of fresh air.

Oops! Forgive the double post!

I mostly agree, though I think that Reboot Brainy would get a slight pass on this. He was, as I recall, raised like a labrat until he was like 12, with no real emotional stimulation and noone who really cared enough about him to teach him proper social skills. I mean, weren't there scenes of him being raised by ROBOTS? So, in his case, I can't help but give him a slight pass because I literally don't think he knows how to interact with other people.

[Bitter old dude rant mode on]

I read this thread with great interest. I guess I was hoping that the distance of nearly 10 years would provide some positive insights about the threeboot, but I guess not.

I skipped the entire threeboot, except for the preview and about three issues later in the run. I would rather DC work with what's been created rather than relaunching the series every few years. That said, I had grown to love the reboot--the early Waid stories, the fresh characterizations, the infusion of politics into the Legion's creation, even Legion Lost--but that incarnation of the Legion lost its way when Abnett and Lanning realized they'd have to write an ongoing series, so it was time to throw out the baby with the bathwater and create a new baby.

Conjure Lass's observation that the threeboot didn't feel like the Legion is dead on. The few issues I've read felt like an entirely new setting and cast of characters on which someone plastered the Legion name for marketing purposes. This is where I grew disillusioned with comics entirely. Yes, I always knew comics were a business and the chief aim of any business is to sell, sell, sell. But Marvel and DC had always maintained a convincing illusion that their stories mattered and that there was a reason for fans to come back other than to keep the company afloat. With the threeboot, that illusion was destroyed for me.

It sounds from many of the comments above that Waid and crew had some genuinely good ideas and fresh takes on certain characters. I'm not surprised that little of it panned out. It's a lot easier to throw in a curve ball, such as Supergirl joining, than to write a real story with beginning, middle, and end. Real stories have consequence. They matter. The characters and their world are somehow different than they were before the story began. Classic Marvel and DC stories masterfully maintained the illusion of change while keeping their franchises going. Events spilled logically from who the characters were and from their reactions to events around them. (Remember when Captain America gave up being Cap and became Nomad? Sure, he went back to being Cap after awhile, but the personal transformation of his journey mattered to him and to the reader.) Sadly, this type of writing seems lost in the bid to constantly shock the reader with the unexpected.


[/Bitter old dude rant mode off]

I rather liked the threeboot, though the initial arc with Lemnos was a wee bit draggy. The good ideas initially were really superb - social stagnation to the point where people in the same room didn't even talk directly to each other, Trip being three of many, Shady being a real warrior, Dreamy being an efficient precog and even her death too, Micro/Colossal Boy from Big City and Atom Girl/Shrinking Violet being a hard nut, the mystery around Rokk going to the 41st century etc etc - all good!

Supergirl was awful though IMO and I very nearly stopped buying at that point - there was one issue in particular that made me gag - the one where Supergirl won the vote to become leader and there were so many obvious mistakes in that one issue it was embarrassing - one example was the total number of votes reached 110% like wtf? Can't writers, artists or editors count? I was so glad that she was sent home though that four issue arc that introduced Wildfire and made Mekt and crew turn against the Legion wasn't terribly good either if I remember right. It wasn't until Shooter took over it had the shot in the arm it needed. That ended dreadfully too unfortunately.

Overall I liked the threeboot - it had promise and some very interesting ideas. Onceagain, in hindsight I do wonder about editorial interference and how it scuppered the plans that Waid and Kitson originally had for their tenure on the book.

I was soooo excited for the Threeboot! I had grown very weary of the dire work DnA were turning out on my formerly much-loved Reboot; but best of all - a Threebooted Legion meant Gim would be alive again! I was pumped to say the least!

The Threeboot didn't get off to the flying start that I was hoping for (like others above, this just didn't feel like theLegion to me) but I was willing to give it a chance. But then the writing just got worse... and worse... and worse... until I could finally take no more at around issue #14 or so I think (just before Supergirl joined) and dropped it.

I truly think that what I read of the Threeboot was the worst period in Legion history, and what makes it so much more especially galling is that we lost the entirety of the infinitely better and more developed and so brimming with potential (despite DnA being well past their use-by-date) Reboot universe for that crap. It breaks my heart.

I could be here all night listing individual problems I had with the Threeboot - the fact I didn't like a single member of the team, even Gim!; the *awful* villains; the pointless and nonsensical changes like whatever was going on with Chlorophyll Kid; the horrible costumes; artwork that was *far* from Kitson's best; the dull coloring and the annoying coloring mistakes - white/grey Tasmia, brunet Rokk, canary yellow Nura etc.; the long, drawn-out stories that had little pay-off; the poor use they made of their extra pages... I really could go on all night but I have to get to bed.

The Threeboot to me is living proof of 'be careful what you wish for'. I wanted Gim back so bad; and then I got him back but he was in this unrecogniseable form and the story he was appearing in was so awful. I would sadly rather have a dead Gim in a good Legion story, than have a living approximation of him in something like the Threeboot again.