Legion World Forums LEGION CLUBHOUSE The Legion of Super-Heroes How do you rate the Great Darkness Saga?

LSH Annual 1 to me, at least when I read through the entire run this past year, That single issue seemed to define a sea change in the style and quality of the Legion stories all up, and it kind of raised the bar for the team.

Not too much to say for the second chapter. Oddly decompressed by the time's standards.

https://comicsarcheology.com/index.php/2022/10/17/legion-of-super-heroes-291-part-1/
https://comicsarcheology.com/index.php/2022/10/17/legion-of-super-heroes-291-part-2/

For the second story, am I the only one who vastly prefers the original version instead of the Giffen re-drawn version?

Parts 3 and 4. Darkseid's reveal still works as the twist, but it's especially imporant given the context of the time: Darkseid wasn't everywhere like in post-Crisis times. In fact, by 1982 he didn't have a ton of appearances outside of Fourth World series, and he almost never appears again afterwards until Crisis.

https://comicsarcheology.com/index.php/2022/10/23/legion-of-super-heroes-292/
https://comicsarcheology.com/index.php/2022/10/29/legion-of-super-heroes-293/

Interesting note about PG & Shady. They seemed to be best friends, but like you say, only superficially. Tinya, at least, seems to be defined in her personality by her relationship to Jo and that's about it.

I also agree with your comments that this is probably the best the Legion has been combining art and story. And the fact that Mon-El gets his butt kicked is significant!

293 - The build up to the reveal at the end was great - the only thing that I always question was why the Daxamites didn't do more damage across the galaxy.

Telescopic vision that you can't control, so you walk into everything in front of you.
Flight, but no coordination.
Reflexes, but with a mind that hasn't adjusted to them.
Being under mind control, and with superpowers that boost the mind to resist it.
The Comics Code that wouldn't allow that level of slaughter.
Off panel, the unsung heroes, Lead Lad and Lead Lass save the galaxy.

Part 5. This is probably the most representative issue of the saga, even though I personally prefer part 4. But this one has EVERYBODY (except Tyroc), it's as epic as it gets, it gives everyone something cool to do... it does have weaknesses, particularly in the finale (took me years to realize the problem with the switched suns), but overall I think it holds up almost perfectly.

https://comicsarcheology.com/index.php/2022/11/03/legion-of-super-heroes-294/

Next will be the "Legion Awards" for this era, which is mostly for fun but I'll also cover the importance of the Great Darkness Saga. That's where this thread will be extremely useful; do you guys mind if I quote some of the posts made in this thread (giving credit of course) ?

Great wrap up of the GDS!

I never noticed the sun color error before. I'm assuming it was colorist/editor error that let that slip by.

But yeah, it's such a classic. I still think the DaVinci pose was an odd choice though.

That's Michelangelo, not DaVinci :-) but yeah, pretty odd.

LOL! OMG I can't believe I did that. Of course it's Michelangelo.

While it was *sweet* seeing Element Lad shut down the Daxamites attacking Earth with a planetary-scale bit of transmutation, it seems like the writers have backed away from that consistently ever since. In the Threeboot, he was limited to touch range, temporary transmutations, and in the later 'Retroboot,' he has to combine his powers with Earth-Man borrowing them *and* have them enhanced by a Green Lantern ring, to fuel a similar planetary-scale act of atmospheric transmutation! (And, canonically, there's no permanent cure for Daxamite lead poisoning. One little exposure and it's incurably fatal, save via Brainy's temporary cure, or sending them all to the Zone... So, yikes?)

For a time, it seemed all the rage to bump various Legionnaires up to truly amazing levels. Sun Boy mimics the radiance of Imsk's sun to attract some migrating space dragons, while Shady blots out the radiance of the actual star to hide it from the dragons! Nothing we'd ever seen before or since had indicated that Shadow Lass could blot out an entire star! It was cool, and fit a team built around Superboy, who juggled planets, back in the day, but it seems like we've settled down to a more 'super, but not CRAZY' level of power for most of the Legion.

Although I have fanwanks for some of them.

A) There's X amount of transmutation available for Trommites to access, and when there were thousands of them, they had very limited powers, but now that Jan's the only one, all that power is his alone. The power of an entire world full of transmuters, in his hands...

B) Deep in the heart of Talokk VIII something lies buried. Is it good? Is it bad? Is Shady feeding it by sending light she negates to it? Or is she sending energy to the heart of Talokk VIII because the planet is old and tired, and only the work of the Shadow Champion(s) keeps the planet's heart warm and molten, the world vital and alive long after it should have gone cold? Or is she keeping something imprisoned down there in the planet's core? Would the planet crack apart like an egg, birthing a new horror on the universe if the Shadow Champion didn't keep it bound? In any event, it would explain why her 'darkfields' are so amazing!

The only fan theory I could come up with is that Brainy calculated the absolute mininimum amount of lead that could hurt the Daxamite without remaining in their system, and the shock freed them Darkseid's control. Admittedly it's not the best explanation but it's something.


That's generally a problem across pre-Crisis DC. Consistency was not exactly a priority for the longest time.


I don't have a problem with that, Sun Boy was able to create a mini-star that attracted the attention of the Sun Eater so I don't think it's much outside of his power.


Fair, but that's a rather specific use of her power that shouldn't come up all that often. How often would she need to obscure an entire star?
At least pre-Crisis it wouldn't do much against Kryptonians and Daxamites, since it seems that as long as they're not under a red star their powers just keep on going... but come to think of it, she could be very effective against post-Crisis ones since they deplete the amount of energy unless they're exposed to some sunlight. Granted it usually takes a long time before they run out of energy, but still.


That's one of the things I dislike about some of the latest incarnations. I totally get wanting to keep the powers under control, but in some cases they went too far. For example, you mentioned Element Lad: I seriously hated how much he was depowered by the Threeboot. Probably in response to how absurdly powerful he could get in earlier versions, but giving him the touch limitation AND the one-hour rule was too much. One of the things I've always loved about Element Lad was that he was a powerhouse without having one of the typical physical powers, but the Threeboot was almost useless.
And since the Legion has a whole Galaxy to protect, it does makes sense to have several members that can work on a planetary scale, as long as there's enough variety in the team.


This is one of the best Legion theories I've ever read, kudos :-)

Yeah, that's my thought, too. That there was an unforeseen lower-level of radiation poisoning that didn't trigger the full-on collapse that Mon-El suffered when Superboy exposed him to those giant balls of lead.

And wow, that went to a weird place in those last four words.



I was pleasantly surprised when, in Legion of Three Worlds, one or more of the Shady's attempted to 'drain the yellow sun energy' out of Superbrat Prime, which was something I'd theorized she might be able to do, but never seen even hinted, and sure as heck flips the apparent power dynamic between her and Mon-El, knowing that she can turn off his powers like that! (Then again, it didn't really work, but, then again again, *nothing* worked the way it was supposed to on Prime, not magic, not kryptonite, probably not antimatter...)


True enough, I definitely felt that Threeboot Element Lad was hit way too hard with the nerf hammer, and could have at least remained at 'Sersi' levels of transmutation goodness. (Plus they straight up ignored their own limitations of touch range more than once!) Ayla as Light Lass got a nice buff, later on, with that massive gravity storm feat, and later helping to rebalance the gravitational balance of the entire solar system.



Thanks! It was something I noodled up for a pondered fanfic dealing with Element Lad and some activists wanting to clone and repopulate Trom (a plan to which he'd be opposed, on purely philosophical and spiritual grounds), since some of the political hobnobbers way behind the well-meaning activists want A) an entire population of transmuters who might be more willing to use their powers for their own economic benefit than Jan has been, and B) an entire new 'world' worth of voters who can be haggled over and divvied up amongst the hungry politicos who can rightly claim that they literally brought them into existence! (so vote for me, the guy who helped give you life!). Jan would be, unamused.

And here's the Legion Awards for this era, as usual more than a little tongue in cheek.
I took the liberty of quoting some of the comments from this thread (lightly edited for brevity but trying to keep the main points), giving the appropriate credit. I hope everyone's okay with it.

https://comicsarcheology.com/index.php/2022/11/05/legion-awards-great-darkness-saga/

It's been a wonderful discussion that has given me more insight than I anticipated on the first Legion story I ever read.

Thanks, CA. I'm flattered that you quoted me. Thanks for starting this poll, it was a great discussion and it helped me learn to better appreciate the good things about GDS.

This was a GREAT write up; a very enjoyable read and thanks for quoting me! Looking forward to the next one!