Finished this one with my daugther. Getting to the point that I'm not sure if shes still understanding it all, stories getting more complicated, story twists often being kind of "huh?" like Karate Kid nearly dying because of an of panel injury he does not notice... my daugther suspected the funny pear to be poisoned, by the way, so many poison stories in the last two archives ...
I never was a fan of Cary Bates writing and I once again see why. Too few members being portrayed in the stories, the plot often slightly dumb or totally pointless. Reminds me of the Legion stories of the 21st century, in a way. If not for the wedding and the Erg-1 multiparter, nothing relevant was being done in so many stories - and stuff like the return of Superboy to the active roster was hardly ever mentioned. Timber Wolf dissappearance was retconned into continuity, confusing for younger readers then and now.
The artwork and the new costumes still are really great, Cockrum definitely had a very good feeling for the characters. When Grell came on board, the art became kind of stiffer, less dynamic.
What I remember from when I was a kid was that I was kind of annoyed when a Legion story didn't live up to my high expectations, spoiled by big stories like the Damn Tabloid. Bates stories often had this kind of underwhelming feeling. Compared to what Shooter did on his Adventure run, Bates stories do not stand the test of time as good, though I do like the first Wildfire stuff.
As I mentioned earlier in the thread, Cockrum and Bates generally had a civil, even friendly relationship, but they did clash on the matter of How Many Legionnaires In One Story. Cockrum's attitude was "the more, the merrier," Bates's seemed to me...well, that he found it intimidating to have more than four or five members in one story. And, unfortunately, Bates's attitude was more in line with that of then-Legion editor Murray Boltinoff, who, as Cockrum described it in his introduction to this volume, got more conservative and less willing to take creative risks as the feature grew more popular. So I think it's really more his fault that Bates's, because he always had the last word.
That said, I do still very much like a few of the Bates stories in this volume. You already mentioned Wildfire's appearances. I also think the Fatal Five one is quite good, and the Timber Wolf/Tyr one, and to a lesser extent the Sun Boy/Regulus one.
In the recent Legion Hall of Fame poll over in the Spaceopoly forum, I came to realize through the subsequent discussions just how important I think Dave Effing Cockrum is to the Legion.
Think about it -- no Cockrum would mean we'd have kept getting crummy, bitty, gimmicky stories and mediocre-at-best artwork. I believe that, without Cockrum, the Legion might have been cancelled within a few more installments. And considering the chaos that DC seemed to be in during the first half of the 70s, there was a very real chance that the Legion wouldn't be seen again until at least the late 80s! And even then, it would've probably gotten some kind of sordid, sensationalistic Proto-Vertigo treatment that would make Five Years Later look tame by comparison. Then, once that had run its course, back to obscurity, until the next lame revival, and the next, and the next.
So, on this Thanksgiving Day, I want to express my thanks for the presence of the late, great Dave Cockrum on the Legion. Thank you, Dave, wherever you are now.
I was thinking much the same thing after your nomination. It was his art that brought the Legion out of obscurity. Cary bates stories were part of it too but without Cockrum's art there probably would have been no sustained revival and everything that has come since then building on that period.
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