Legion World Forums LEGION CLUBHOUSE The Legion of Super-Heroes Long Live the Legion! Lightning Saga Legion in Action!

Those are very good points.
As far as i'm concerned, I understand that the new "original" Legion will be as "original" as the new Superman is, meaning that we'll get differences to their stories linked to the fact that this is a world that's post Infinite Crisis and things may be sligfhtly different.

Karate Kid seems to be unaware that Triplicate Girl is Una, which could indicate he comes form a different time period than the others... of course, with this costume, he should know her as Duo Damsel. At the same time, he knows that Sensor Girl is Jeckie... That seems to indicate a few differences...

But I don't mind. Even if the chronology is slightly modified, it means that the characters I grew up and loved are back, not the Archie imitation, and not the Mark Waid debacle...

Hm, I see this point that you and Eryk have made and that makes things quite a bit clearer on where people stand. I agree that the current Superman "is-essentially-but-isn't-truly-the-Earth-1 Superman". I'm cool with that to a degree, though I wish he was more like the Earth-1 Superman. In that same token, this Legion will be largely similar to that notion. Its basically the same for Batman too.

My first Legion comic was #202. It contained a Cockrum-drawn/Grell-inked new story with Colossal Boy and Shrinking Violet that reintroduced Erg-1/Wildfire -- whom I had never heard of. It has the Swan-era reprint of the Super-Stalag of Space. Different artists, different outlooks, for all practical purposes, different Legions, all crammed into a 50-cent 100-page spectacular. I was more delighted than confused. I was 10.

I look at the legions of Legions spread across the DCU today -- animated Legion, including their revisions for next season, Lightning saga Legion, WaK Legion, Mon-El in Action -- and frankly, except for having to spend $15.00 instead of $0.50 -- I am just as delighted and confused as I was 33 years ago.

I think I'm in an ever-shrinking minority, but I like the WaK Legion, and I also like the mystery of the relationships among the LS-Legion, pre-Crises Legions, and the WaK Legion. It is potentially the strongest Legion storyline in a generation.

I think a lot of the problem is that the notion of the "original" Legion is just so ambiguous to begin with.

For me (and this is what I really agreed with in Matthew's post), the original Legion is this thing that survived the Crisis while having a bit of its history altered, then having a bunch more of its history altered in v4, and was finally wiped out in End of an Era. If one is going to genuinely bring back the original Legion, one needs to explain how that team survived their "whiting out" in End of an Era. If you want to go on to retcon their history even more at that point, then I'm not incredibly happy with that (unless it's the kind of retcon that undoes previous retcons), but I'd still count it as the original team.

Assuming what appears to be the case, which is that the Lightning Saga Legion is from another one of the 52 earths, then the "origin" of this team is basically that it started out as a duplicate of the WaK Legion on another Earth, only its history was eaten by Mr. Mind until it resembled that of the pre-Crisis Legion. If someone wants to count that as bringing the original Legion back, then I suppose that's their choice. And if the continuity were literally identical to what it was in 1985, then even I might be inclined to say for all practical purposes that they "brought back the pre-Crisis Legion", and would probably be much more enthusiastic about it than I am. But it seems to me they've complicated things so much with all this cross-dimensional "New Earth" Superman stuff, plus whatever else it is that they've changed, that I'm not inclined to feel anything for this version simply because it's the "original" Legion in some really loose sense of the term.

Of course, if they write good stories featuring this version of the team (which imo they haven't thus far), I'm certain my view of it will change. But I can't ever imagine considering it anything more than a simulacrum of the "original" Legion.

More random speculative thoughts, this time probably spurred on by the human parainfluenza virus I'm trying to get out of my system:

--what if Superman is persona non grata because the LS Legion HAS gone looking for other Kal-Els, and ended up with Superboy Prime?

--what if the LS Legion is responsible for wiping out the history of Superboy? Maybe New Earth had a Superboy, and the Legion wiped out that knowledge for some reason, but the memories are starting to leak back?

--what if the LS Legion hooked up with New Earth Supes to PREVENT a Superboy? Maybe all Superboys are destined to end up like Prime, too powerful, all alone, whatever? The LS Legion makes it their mission to mentor young Clarks so they end up as heroes?

--the LS Legion can time/dimension hop with relative ease, while the New Earth Legion can't. Is their Brainy smarter? Or can they do this because they have outside help? Like a captive Flash? Or a Pet Monitor?

So to anybody who is reading Countdown: How do we have to understand the disclosure of the identity Karate Kids mysterious Legion friend after the end of the Lightning Saga? Any feelings? I for my part feel totally confused, but as long as it's the "classic Legion" confusing me, I will be going along...

I went to Wizard online to see if they had sketches. They didn't have Dawnstar but they did have Frank's Supes and it appears the main villain.

<span class="spoiler_containter"><span class="spoiler_wording">Click Here For A Spoiler</span><span class="spoiler_text">Darkseid</span></span>

Gary Frank\'s sketches SPOILERS

Some people have commented his Superman is very Curt Swan. I agree.

No comments on the Countdown storyline here? It IS Lightning Saga Legion in action after all... I don't dare to say who it was that Karate Kid met because I don't know how to include a spoiler here - that is, how to hide a spoiler - but hey, does nobody feel like discussing this?

There was a thread...somewhere about Legion members appearing in other titles. I can't find it? I'm I still half asleep?

Chemical King --

Check out page 46 of this thread for the discussion you're looking for.

Also, to post a spoiler, click on "Full Reply Form." You should see a menu called Instant UBB Code. The "Spoiler" option is in the fourth column.

Hi,fellow Legionworlders...been a while since I've been this forum...I miss being here.
I just got ahold of "The Lightning Saga" recently... tell me if it's really true... the REAL Legion is really comming back?
I've put up with the the "current" Legion, being a LSH fan, but my FAVORITE Legion??? returning??? it's too good to be true...one question though? How would Supergirl fit into this?

Based on how Johns and Meltzer wrote 'The Lightning Saga', it's not clear to me that this Legion is meant to be exactly the original Legion. Although clearly they're a variation on the original Legion. And DC does seem to have some plans for them, but it's anyone's guess how that's going to turn out.

Best I can figure, Supergirl doesn't fit into it at all.

Anyone notice that the Legions in Booster Gold?

A small panel just past the middle page that featured the three founders and Clark (they look SO young!)and B5 in the purple jumpsuit on the last page.
Well, they could be the same Legion from different eras...just which Brainiac lost that flight ring anyway?

Over here Art.

Yeah.
With so many convoluted Time Stream stories going on it makes perfect sense to have a few different versions of a futuristic super-team getting mixed up in the works. I'm lovin' it. I've always loved sci-fi super-hero stories and we're getting plenty.

I don't know why or who but somebody at DC finally discovered the wealth of material in the Legion mythos and wants to take advantage of it. I for one am all for it. We'll get some confusing things here and there but it'll all shake out.

I'm hoping for an All-Star Legion sometime late next year.

Um, anyone see the latest Action cover 859??? I kinda like it but I kinda don't. Lightning Lad looks the best by far. The others? eh. Saturn Girl looks OK...Cosmic Boy...I question. Don't hate it though...it can grow on me. His haircut on the other hand???!

Horrible!!!!

They look worse than the Giffen Legion. Lightning Lad looks effeminate and Saturn Girl looks butch. Cos looks like the evil Cosmic King.

Come to think of it -- maybe this is an updated version of the LSV. Well, we can hope!

You think that Kubert cover is suppossed to be the Legion of the 90's? What if the Legion continued and got mirred in all that dark/violent low quality 90's? (Cause Superman wasn't a member anymore)

well, from the bits of info we got about this storyline, it just could be the case...

Didn't like that cover either

Actually, you have a good point - Kubert representing 90s comics (he DID do X-Men back then) in its worst, not cause he's a bad artist - he isn't - but because comic books back then mostly told lousy stories and went nowhere. I loved the good "dark and gritty" stories like Watchmen, DK returns or 5YL, but when the Image Age struck, and comic books like the Titans and X-Men tried to follow, many books went downhill.

So IF there would have been no 5YL, but a regular continuation of the Baxter series, maybe we would have gotten a Legion which would have looked like this alternate Kubert cover...

But: Gary Frank is the regular artist now on Action, so I still hope the REGULAR cover will look less like an X-Legion.

Little bit of Legion info from the Toronto comic book convention (as per CBR... funny how thgis is a major convention and it's not covered "live")

"Dini says he will remain with “Countdown” as head writer until it ends and with “Detective Comics” until at least the end of 2008. He also answered a question from the floor regarding the three versions of the Legion of the Superheroes currently running side by side in DCU with the simple response: “Keep reading ‘Countdown.'”"

You can see he truly sees this as the original Leigon cut off right after Crisis (probably with things explaining inconsistencies like Karate Kid still being alive).

Presumbly, Crisis itself is responsible for creating an alternate timeline going forward, much like the classic Adventure story is a possible alternate timeline (from John's POV), but I would think we would know for sure from the story.

Yay! Villains!