Legion World Forums LEGION CLUBHOUSE The Legion of Super-Heroes Long Live the Legion! Contemplations of the new Legion (... and how I found comics again)

The Legion and me go back a while (albeit this means little since I'm 19). About 8-9 years ago I stumbled across my dads collection of Legion comics, which included the entire v4 run and a considerable number of Superboy and the Legion from back in the 60s, as well as some issues from the 70s. I read them all and loved them, what can I say I was hooked... Sadly, at the time and this would be approximatley in 1998, I was living in Romania and away from any source of Legion comics. Two years later when I came to reside in the US lack of access to a proper comic shop prevented me from getting Legion comics. Rather I followed the newly rebooted Amazing Spiderman title (which I had been kept up to date on, through some connections... this had been one of my favorite heroes as a kid, and yeah...)

And that was it for Legion titles until now... Recently thanks to the newly launched Battlestar Galactica comics (i've been following the show with some enthusiasm), I got back into comics. You see around issue 39 of Amazing I stoped my subscription, and not having a comic shop in easy reach, floated between various titles I could find in book stores (before they started heavily carrying graphic novels and news shops that also carried comics). Eventually I settled on graphic novels as an easier way to keep up, reading a lot of Ultimate titles. Anyway... back to the now!

So just like that I got back into it, mostly thanks to finding a shop near the college I attend... luckly I saw the new Legion title and couldn't resist so I got it. To be precise that was issue #20... which was lucky because I shortly went out and got the graphic novels which end right with issue 19... thus I was caught up and also, ironically, converted to DC. I'd been primarily a Marvel guy, but with the whole Civil War thing raging, it just didn't seem all too friendly, rather I'm now reading the newly launched JSA, Green Lantern Corps, even took a peek at the Supergirl title and might follow that a bit... and yeah Marvel's Ghost Rider too, but that doesn't really tie into Civil War so anyway...

Legion Legion Legion!!! I drifted so back I come to the primary topic. Thanks to special circumstances, and dispite my age, I've had a good sampler of original Legion titles, well before getting the new Waid/Kitson re-interpretation, and here's what I think... People need to stop complaining. I hear all the problems with this Legion, not to mention that I question the introduction of Supergirl in terms of the impact she has had. I completley agree that Legion titles should be connected to someone from the 'Super' family, because of the long history with Superboy, but in her dreamy (ironic since she replaced Dream Girl in a sense) state she has been of little use to the plot... one can only hope that after Kandor this will change.

But what I cannot understand are long-time fans quiting the title because of the new run, specifically because of Supergirl. Yes the members of Terror Firma were not well characterized, but at the same time the original Legion run until Zero Hour had three decades of back story. Waid and Kitson are trying to rebuild that legacy and as long as Terror Firma characters will recur, I will not complain, since that will allow them to become more complex. The legion has been without a doubt most affected by reboots, of almost any title I know, and that is because twice now its been rebooted from the bottom, scrapping all that came before. What the title needs is stability. It is too late to go back and say, psyche we didn't mean anything with the reboots and simply go back to the roots, simply bring back the old legion. The title needs a good decade of development, and it will be back to the complexity which many fans desire. A complexity, which I honestly can't trully see happening over night.

Supergirl sadly only complicated matters, she should probably have been brought in a little later. With a lot of legionaires still not very well characterized she's only served to complicate matters in that department, and has been a blank slate so far, nor really adding anything. Now that she's going to hopefully admit that this is not just a dream, things may get a bit more interesting with her, but again horrible timing. Not to mention that for some reason Kitson was not on full penciling duty during most of this time, which also has been felt.

Yet dispite all of this the plot has been rather ingenious so far. I really love the developments surrounding Brainiac 5 and Dream Girl, it trully serves to bring a new dimension to his character... and again somthing that will need to be developed in the future. Also, the reinvisioning of the Legion as a movement rather than just a club is awesome. Overall the plot has attempted to do the best it can with an overloaded team roster. When the legion started out it was only Cosmic Boy, Saturn Girl, and Lightining Lad... however every reboot so far has had a 20+ team roster, ironically just because of the long history of the Legion. And here's where I fail to understand old fans giving it up, if they quit the title, sales will drop, and another reboot may loom (and here's where I further fail to understand the few that support such a thing), which would drive the final stake into the Legion's heart.

The title needs a stable run to develop, and no more reboots so that it can begin to resemble its former self. So people go and buy the Legion! The story's even getting better, signaling that the Supergirl intro slump was temporary. I'm so happy that I can build my own collection that I may one day pass on to my kids, heck I don't want reboots ruining that. I can only hope to see additional Legion titles in the future as miniseries or standing series (I'd be interested in seeing someone do a miniseries about the Legionaries that aren't on the main team, the regular memebers if you will...)

Hmm... I think this is a good place to end this verbose first post.

-Thinbalion

Welcome to Legion World!

You make a lot of good points, thinbalion. It does take time to build - or rebuild - the complexity and I think many fans are hoping to avoid another reboot.

It's pretty interesting that now we're getting second generation Legion fans - it shows that a good concept is timeless. Good thing your dad saved those comics!

Hey, add a couple years to the tally, and that's *my* origin story! Think I have an infringement case?

Hi thinbalion, welcome to Legion World.

Verbose . . . pshaw!

Welcome to Legion World.

Yeah I know, and I think its interesting to mention that his collection stopped dead with the Zero Hour issue... nothing after that. Ah reboots...

Anyway, thanks a lot, glad to be here.

welcome, thinbalion! don't be shy! tell us what you really think!

In response to your question, some of us were very optimistic of the new book, and until the last few months, felt let down. Some were suspicious of a need to completely start over, having seen that happen before. And some fans of various eras loved "their" era, but are dismissive of any other eras.

I think in general most of us judge the current book on its own merits, but when things are not going well (or seem that way), it is human tendancy to compare it to better times.

But I'm happy to say the book does seem to be getting better again, and may others who have grumbled seem to agree.

I must say that in general I don't like reboots. I don't know there's something about seeing the numbering of a comic in the hundreds, that makes you feel the history behind it. Reboots kill that, so while they do work to draw new people in (I won't lie the Waid/Kitson reboot is part of why I'm reading the Legion now), they also destroy an important part of the legacy of a title.

That being said, yeah... the grass does always seem to be greener, but I think the new Legion says it best: they stand against stagnation and as Sun Boy say "He's not going to be content until we're just like him! Until we're afraid of the future." It doen's matter who the 'He' is in this case, but the point is to not be afraid of the future. In a sense the legion can never be what it was, we can only hope the future will bring about good things.

--Thinbalion

I like comic-book-reading origin stories, verbose or not.

If you're interested in other posters' origins, there's a thread crammed full of 'em here.

Welcome!

Gotta agree; even though I miss the post-ZH legion I grew up with, another reboot would be disastrous.

I have a hunch "reboots" as we know them are becoming passe... the next relaunch of LSH (however many years away that is) will probably have to recognize that it needs LSH's long, rich history, and would somehow incorporate all three timelines rather than start a fourth.

Heh... yeah I noticed that thread after I posted...

Combining the timelines could be possible even now, in the form of the legionnaires somehow getting the memories of those that came before them.

It'll be interesting to see what they do over in JSA in regards to that team's multiple histories, and whether however they address that could also be used for the Legion.

As far as I know, the JSA still remember Earth-2 and their pre-Crisis history.

That seems odd to me, and not something that's necessarily good for the Legion.

Yeah, I'm not a big fan of multiple sets of memories, either.

I'd rather some integrated timeline kind of thing be done, but I'm not sure how.

Well, if the idea is to get everything in, that quite possibly means a Legion that's been around for a generation or two, with plenty of backstory and membership turnover, and deciding who was a member when, and where they are now.

I don't think there's a way such an integration would make everybody happy, because no change ever makes everybody happy.

True, thats the problem with bringing up old history unless you bring it all back you'll inevitably make someone unhappy.

I still think DC is laying the groundwork to bring back the multiverse, and the possibility of multiple versions of the Legion existing side by side.

dont' bet the mortgage on it. by then the company will try to bring in new readers and have a fresh start. so it will most likely be another change like the current one.

of course, that's assuming that comic books will survive the far flung future. Legion is the most mainstream book I read these days. I find it diffcult usually to read super hero books, because often it just seems like a retread of what I read as a kid.

why oh why was my dad into such shit comics?