Legion World Forums LEGION CLUBHOUSE The Legion of Super-Heroes Long Live the Legion! Are You a Fascist UP Sympathizer?

So, my first created post on Legion World. Might as well offend everybody with the subject.

Reading all the wonderful comments on LSH #1, I am struck by the differing opinions about the Legionnaires' actions on Lallor. Some posters see them as heroic, others have more sympathy with the cautious approach urged by the UP Senators. Some readers are excited by these dynamic teenage heroes, others see them as spoiled, petulant children deserving of come-uppance from their elders.

It's great to see the new Legion provoking (good) controversy among fans. Where do each of you come down? Are you with the Legionnaires, or critical and suspicious of them?

For myself, at first I found myself thinking "Cosmic Boy, listen to these Senators. It's good, sensible advice."

Then, I remembered 1989. I was finishing up college as Tiananmen Square in China unfolded. I raptly read the papers everyday to see if the students would out-maneuver those corrupt mandarins of the communist party. I wept when the tanks rolled over those kids. It was one of those times (as is the recent, horrific tsunami) that I wished super-heroes WERE real, and could swoop in and save the day for justice. Having been shamed by my own grown-up-ness, I eagerly await the unfolding of the UP/Legion conflict.

I'm on the Legionnaires side, I guess. But I'm expecting that, as some other posters have stated, we'll find out that neither side is completely right or wrong.

Just re-read E.M. Forester's "The Machine Stops" this morning. I'm expecting that the Legion setting we're in right now is an earlier version of that world, that doesn't have to turn out quite so badly.

And that fits with the comments Gail made about her arc leading into the new series - bunch of Luddite terrorists fighting the Legion. Kind of an ironic twist, if that's where the new series is headed.

I'll be horribly disappointed if it turns out that a Universo type is behind some big governmental plot.

I thought Universo was persona non grata to Mark and Barry for the duration.

I'd rather see a facist society that is the result of a slow evolution that came about a little bit at a time to the point that people are just "this is the way things have always been and the way they should be because it's all we know" type of thing.

Maybe. The "we're so sick of it" read like teenage whine to me.

However...a petulant expression doesn't preclude genuine motivation. I'm def. interested in seeing how this is going to unfold.

UPizza!

My first thought upon reading #1 was,"oh great. It's the Legion of Super Hippies." However, I'm kind of warming up to the idea. I think true heroism is standing up for what you believe in, even when others are opposed to your ideas. And God knows we could use a bit of youthful idealism in today's world.

yeah, i am wondering what's so bad about peace and stability.

but we will probably find out who's rights are being stepped in the u.p.

the dark underbelly of utopia?

I gotta say I'm on the SP side. But yeah I found myself with Cosmic Boy and the UP side more often. BUT seeing all those KIDS slaughtered...having those powers...I would have kicked their tail as well. If it was a small group and there was some type of misunderstanding I may have played it by the book...but a slaughter like this? No way.

Jorge (i hope we get a sympathetic SP)

i think there is so much more to this than we know.

Why are the Legion rebelling against a apparent safe, caring, well provided for utopia?

Why are the UP and Earth so afraid of the future?

Why is there a fear of a galactic war?

Why is the UP keen to recruit Lallor? and why is that planet more prepared to use force, even on its own people, to get its own way? Is this Tiananmen Square? (as an aside I just saw a TV documentary about the university shootings in 1970's USA. Is this a more approariate image?)

Is the UP aware of the hate, fear and violence, out there, in the galaxy and is trying to recruit new member states in order to protect the kids from this sort of thing?

so many questions, not enough answers.

Whiny teens aren't necessarily wrong.

I see the UP's accpetance of them as a menas to control and manipulate - in asome ways, they may be worse than the SPs.

The LSH may not be perfect, but they're honest and trying. They win MY support, hands dowm, even if this wasn't the Legion we're talking about.

Although the Senators are calling for caution as they try to negotiate the peace, we've seen enough real life examples of "peace treaties" which only feather the nest of a particular power group. Could those old political hacks actually be trying to manipulate an idealistic teenager, who is probably in over his head?

I'll go with the legionnaires' instincts on this one - at this point they're probably only bringing trouble on themselves and not endangering any so-called peace. Presumably, the adults who rebelled and were slaughtered on Lallor had a lot more to fight about than teenage dissatisfaction with an adult world. Kids may recklessly take on authority, but I don't think many adults resist the police/military without considerable cause. As Faraway wrote, a lot more to this than we know.

Now I am a bit confused on rereading the issue. Is the rebellion on Lallor one of teenage Legion supporters or adults?

The Legionnaires arrive on Lallor saying, For once - it's not us. Cos mentions armed adult rebellion. So it seemed to me that these were adults who had been massacred. Yet we see people (young-looking, anyways) in Legion-symbol shirts and there's a reference to a kid who lost his arm - which would imply the youthful Legion adherents.

FC,

I think it was definitely adults massacreing (sic?) kids on Lallor. The kids are the legionnaires/legion sympathizers/legion political party on Lallor.

What is unclear at this point is whether the adults doing the massacreing were just a mob, a rival political faction, the government-sanctioned militia, a rogue group of the militia, or some combination of the above. Barry sure drew them as a uniformed military sort of group, so they looked pretty official to me. I suppose Lallorian adults might all have identical body-armor, but that seems implausible.

I am very interested to see if events like the Lallor massacre are followed up on and explained a bit better in context.

It depends. Do they have a good benefit package, including a dental plan? What about 401k matching?

Starbucks,

I am sure that's how the UP co-opted all the adults. NO ONE offers good dental coverage these days.

FC

The way I read the lallor situation was.

The Kids (legionnaires) have been formed into a political party which sommehow had tipped the balance of power in the parliament (or whatever they have)

Rather than accept that the adults might loose power a grouping of adults on Lallor "rebelled" and tried to take power. The Kids either thought they could copy the example of the legionnaires outside HQ in metropolis and form a human shield to protect parliament or as in the Ukraine took to the streets to protest. Unfortunatly the adults decided to use deadly force to clear the streets (Lallor is not a UP world after all) and thats what the Legion came in to.

Thanks for the clarifications, Darden & d.chinner. That makes more sense to me now. I guess I was projecting some wishful thinking onto the scene - that there would actually be some adults in this galaxy who sided with the kids!