Legion World Forums LEGION CLUBHOUSE The Legion of Super-Heroes Long Live the Legion! So...how would YOU relaunch/reboot the Legion?

If you take Steve W at his word, "Legion" is cancelled. But Gail says there are big plans for the Legion ahead. Tat spells relaunch/reboot to me.

If you were brought in to take over, what would you do to start off the new series?

New villians, new concepts, lots of characterization and as many characters as possible.

And sex it up a little too, but not too much. And Jim Lee can draw it .

Could you be a BIT more specific?

LESION of SUPER HEROES starring INFECTIOUS LASS
In the 31st century, Drura leads a group of infirm teens on a wild klanth chase through the United Planets looking for cures for their various ailments!

I'd do a new milennium version of "Five Years Later..." Move the perspective forward to a point when the team is in their early to mid twenties so that we can see some really adult relationships. Get back to the days when writers (read: Paul Levitz) would focus on a small mission team for an issue or two to develop five or six Legionnaires, then shift the focus to another group, and so on. Bring back the slightly "Cold War" feel of relations between the UP and the Khunds (i.e. no overt encroachment, but subterfuge and arms race stuff). Stop farting around in the new galaxy and have someone invent an FTL space drive that doesn't rely on mutated members of Gate's species. Move the focus from world-threatening crises to smaller-scale villainy. I'll try to think of more later, but this is a start for what I'd do with the book.

God forbid there'll be another reboot, but if there was, I'd probably make it similar to Superboy's Legion and include Supergirl. I'd trash Legion World, the 2nd Galaxy, the Kwai race and bring in some fresh new villains with more compelling motivations and goals than the old take over the world/galaxy/universe because I'm hungry for power schtick.

Oh, yeah. I'd call it "Adventure Comics starring the Legion of Super Heroes."

I'd reboot the SAME characters with the SAME powers, as a team of super time travelers. Their base of operations would still be 31st century earth, but they would travel back and forth to different eras, avoiding only the 20th/21st century DCU. They are also able to travel to other dimensions/universes. They would work in small sub-teams of say, 4-6 Legionnaires each. The issues would intertwine the stories of each active sub-team.

The leader of the time-traveling LSH would be the noble and powerful transmuter, Jan Arrah, assisted by the temporal scientists Querl Dox and Lyle Norg, and engineer Chuck Taine. The serious romances established in previous series would remain intact. Jo and Tinya (no Cub) would be happily married, as would Imra and Garth (restored to his old self). Thom and Nura would be together, too, but no one else. I would reduce the size of the team by deleting Kid Quantum, XS, Gates, Karate Kid, Timber-Wolf, Sensor and Kinetix. Superboy would be gone as well, but M'onel would stay put.

The first arc would be set in the Dark Ages of Europe (team A) and 10,000 years in the future in a parellel universe (team B). They don't have to worry too much about changing the past or the future, because DC continuity is f*cked anyway.

I like your ideas A LOT, TC.

Two words.

Keith Giffen.


I jest! I jest!

From where it finished

Been there. Done that. Don't want to go there again! (Even in jest! )

Well at least you're not beating me with sticks....

If I was going to relaunch the Legion...

I'd get someone with more talent than I have when it comes to writing... shouldn't be too hard... this someone would also have to love the Legion and know it's history. And they'd also have to be an established creative talent. I'd give this talent a "name" artist(s) and trust them to do some quality stories.

That sounds like the rumor that's going around anyway... so it seems to me like a step in the right direction. What I care about is good, quality stories with a hint of original thought to them. If this can be done pre-boot, re-boot, de-boot, un-boot, cowboy-boot, das-boot... whatever, then I'm for it.

Everyone in khakis. Except Gates, he can sport a sweater vest.

Whatever they chose, I'd like to see a bit of humor on the side. How about another open audition with new Legion rejects. Matter-Eater Lad! Cooler villains. More supporting characters and focus on ignored legionnaires.

I actually wouldn't change anything. I'd just make sure there was room for characterization and more interweaving plots rather than a central universal threat each time out.

Honestly, at this point I think I'd throw the continuity baby OUT with the bathwater, chuck it ALL and tell the Legion stories I wanted to tell, continuity be screwed.

If I wanted to use Dawnstar, I'd USE her, no explanations. If I wanted to tell the origin of the LSH starring Calamity King, Calorie Queen and Hate-Face, I'd DO it. Frag continuity.

Fortunately for you guys, It's not up to me...

i would add a few more classic characters to the legion - like sun boy, dawnstar and blok, etc. - add more friendships and bring back those levitz clicques, have the legion deal with everyday threats as well as the starlin-esque ones, focus more on jazmin (just kidding), and basically try to follow the geoff johns model of bringing back the best of the old-school treats and, instead of having those treats hog-tie me, find myself inspired by them instead and move boldly into the future with exciting storytelling...

My first post on this board is about all this galaxy rocking news. Suits me.
I would carefully select a editor/writer combo for at least a 5 year run; a pool of 2 or 3 (reliable) artists in order to maintain visual coherence on the titleduring this period. Maybe one completely new talent, an actually highly reputed one and a former Legion man. A great cover artist for the first two years.
I would reestablish the concept: beacon of hope in a not so smooth political entity within a universe full of perils. I would preserve (and explain to newcomers while at it) the things that make the title so unique: It's autonomy from the DCU main (and it's loooong time connections), meaning no actual crossovers with titles outside the 31 st century, it's lingoisms and classic gadgets and staples (from 'sprock' to it's inherent cosmopolitics, stopping by the flight rings).
I would refrain the introduction of new characters (between pre boot and post boot, there's more than enough for a 15 year run without fear of redundancy), ammeliorating both heroes, villains, so-so's and supporting cast.
I would further emphasize the sci fi aspect as well the density of the writing; no Mon-El playing coolie to a dwarf star nor permanent teens anymore; start with young adults and make them grow. The reader core is not a teenagers one and the average comic reader is not comprised of prepubescent kids also. No gratuitous grim or vertigo 'style'. A balance can and should be struck.
I'll keep reading, in either case.

Shvaughn Erin wakes up in bed.

"Wow, that was one sprocking nightmare!" she says in her thoughts. "The Legion finds doubles of itself ... Earth blows up ... the universe is wiped out ... everything about the Legion starts all over again ... half of them get blown into another galaxy ... they battle villains from centuries past ... a new Superboy ... sheesh, I'm glad I wasn't awake!"

Jan Arrah comes in dripping wet from the shower, towel around him, using another to dry his hair. [Trom didn't develop instant body dryers.] "Honey, you okay? Look like you've seen a ghost."

"Jan, it was only three days ago that my SP mini-cruiser picked up most of you in the Legion, standing on a chunk of what had been Zerox ... wasn't it?"

"That you did, and I'm glad you guys were able to put a few together that worked from spare parts. I don't know what those of us without long-distance flight would've done, stranded in that new asteroid belt."

The door chimes ring. Shvaughn gets up to answer them, still logy and shaking her head.

She greets two women at the door, a platinum blond in soft curls and a regal robe, and a winged brunette in halter and breechcloth. "Jeckie! Dawny! Is it time for brunch already? Come in, and I'll have Computo's hide for not waking me up."

Jan comes in, fully dressed, and turns to the blond. "Well, Fearless Leader, can you interpret my lady's crazy dreams, or is that a job for Nura?"

The impulse for the above was shamelessly borrowed from "Dallas." (Go Google it, you whippersnappers who weren't around in 1980. Use "Bobby Ewing" and "shower.")

Other than wanting a reversion back to just after the Magic Wars (the "LSH" v3 n64 that should've been, and which will never happen), I endorse Lash's suggestion. Screw continuity. Use whoever fits a well-told, vivid story.

I have to say that - potential duplication of abilites aside (which we already have several cases of anyway) - there's nothing to stop any writer using a post-boot Dawny.

Isn't that the moment that everyone says Dallas irretrivably jumped the shark?

Okay, I'll risk posting this again. Though, I've enjoyed most of the ideas posted so far. My re-boot thoughts stem from a desire to make the future less Earth-centric and give the Legion a less Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew founding.

Earth is a minor new member of the well-established Federated Planets. Earth's government is struggling to grow more influential after finally overcoming centuries of its own internal conflicts.

Earthgov recruits a squad of super-powered individuals to investigate the political machinations of the FP. Its members could be Invisible Kid, Colossal Boy, Ferro Lad, Sun Boy, Saturn Girl (on loan from Titan, which has maintained a steady alliance with Earth).

The first ten issues begin with the formation of the squad and their travels to learn more about the workings of the FP. They meet other interesting characters like Cosmic Boy and Lightning Lad.

The arc culminates when the squad learns of a plot by powerful FP members Xanthu and Khundia to manufacture reasons for the takeover of the government of the FP Member, Orando. A method that they've already used successfully to enslave Winath and Durla.

The squad informs the Eathgov President Macauley, who would rather work a deal with Khundia and Xanthu then step up and expose their threat. Instead, the squad decides together, and against the wishes of those in power, to expose the plots. In the resulting fiasco, the FP and Earthgov governments crumble.

The squad prepares to go their separate ways, but are surprised when the heroes they met on their travels begin to pursue membership. A re-structured United Planets takes the place of the FP, and establishes the Legion from the remainder of the squad and the new members who make it in.

A re-launch actually sounds a bit harder. ... Maybe "2.5 Years Later?"

Sheesh... every time I'm away from the PC for a few days, something like this happens! Y'know, we Legion fans oughtta be used to these relaunches by now. Every five years or so...

If I relaunched the Legion, I'd...

... open with a tear forming in the sky of a planet that's Earth-like... but isn't Earth. Or, at least, isn't 'our' Earth, or that of pre or reboot DC.

Three pairs of gloved hands would widen the rip in the sky and 14 costumed heroes would emerge in flight. ELEMENT LAD, SHRINKING VIOLET, AYLA RANZZ, LUORNU DURGO (QUINTESSA), INFERNO (Dirk), STAR BOY, DREAMER, TENZIL, BRAINIAC 5, PHANTOM GIRL, ULTRA BOY, COSMIC BOY, LIGHTNING LAD and SATURN GIRL zoom through the sky. They are in their mid to late 20s, a result of the merger of adult and teen selves that occurred at the conclusion of END OF AN ERA.

In short order, they'd meet other-dimensional analogs of many of their 'unmerged' teammates. Eventually, they'd find a way to connect to other dimensional possibilites, perhaps rejoining a DCU timeline. Perhaps it would be revealed that this 'new' Earth *is* the future of the 'current' DCU.

I liked Tromium Crystal's idea of adventures through time... but I'd like to see that as but one avenue in which the heroes travel. Old foes would reappear, but mostly new threats would be faced.

I'd want Lyle, Gates, Umbra, XS and 'classic' Zoe added in pretty quickly.

TN