Legion World Forums LEGION CLUBHOUSE The Legion of Super-Heroes Justice League vs. The Legion of Super-Heroes #6 - Preview and Spoilers

I hate to say it, but it looks like a once great writer has gone downhill, just like John Byrne and Frank Miller before him. But this time it's even more disappointing. At least Byrne and Miller made such asses out of themselves in interviews that it was almost a relief to not have to defend their art any more. But Bendis seems like he's still a nice guy by all accounts. I want to still like his writing, but he's not making it easy.

I disagree, the blame belongs to Mike Carlin.

Was he behind the Superman mandate post-Crisis?

I promised to say only positive things. Ryan Sook's art is pretty, and, like Coipel, Manapul and Cinar before him in the Threeboot and Retroboot, I hope to see more of this new Legion artist in the future. I've been introduced to some great artists on this book, over the years (Lightle, LaRocque, etc.), so it's nice to see the trend continue.

He was not behind the "Superman was not Superboy" mandate, but he was behind the "erase even the Pocket-Universe Superboy from Legion history" mandate.

Well said Set, and well done.

Gotcha, that was the one I was thinking about.

IMO, both of them, Carlin and Byrne deserve criticism around this. And if we're being honest, Giffen & the Bierbaums need to be included in there too. Their overcorrection of the Glorithverse added so much more complexity to the continuity that it made things more difficult for everyone, IMO. They could have kept writing and avoid the supers all together. But that's a topic for another thread.

Well, I finally got around to reading this final issue and I have to say I was very underwhelmed with the finished product. Where does this new Legion go from here I wonder.

I think Bendis entered into this project assuming, since he was starting the Legion over from scratch, he didn't care about their prior characterization and core personality traits. Which is why so many of his Legionnaires have little to no personality. He tried to rely on their physical characteristics through Ryan Sook's new designs to carry them until he had a chance to shine the spotlight on them, and it... did not work. Because he tried doing too much and it never happened, which is how he probably got bored with it.

Yes SK, I agree with the things you said. Maybe after this last story this iteration can just go into "limbo" like others (ie: Threeboot Legion) have done.
I hope someone else comes along and reinvents the classic Legion, staying true to its origins while giving us a fresh, contemporary take on it! Here's hoping (fingers crossed).

It’s annoying, because if Bendis had paced it better… the Threeboot also started with a large cast, but they were introduced to us with starting stories focusing on 4-8 Legionnaires at a time. Here we just get 30+ all in crowd scenes, so most of them got barely any development

Some of them didn't get ANY development. Violet, Tenzil, poor X-Ray Girl, the other two Sook created...

I really don't know how any new fans or folks that buy anything Bendis really liked it - I've never heard any critical reviews that go into why they like it so much. But when I read it it seems too ADHD even for me. You have so many things going on in the background that do nothing other than provide distraction - "Why is Vi eating with Star Boy? Are they going to do something together?" which all leads to nothing.

Here's hoping they make the call to do something more interesting next time with people who actually care about the book. With this latest experiment, I felt like Bendis went to DiDio and asked for this. DiDio said, "no one gets the Legion anymore" then Bendis said "I can fix it" and promptly made things worse.

I've always liked 'new' Legionnaires, from when 'new' meant Dawnstar or Tellus, or the new Reboot characters Kid Quantum, Gates, Dragonmage, etc. or even those lonely new Threeboot characters, Gazelle, Theena, Turtle and Sizzle, so I was really hoping for some interesting stuff about 'X-Ray Girl' (who we never really met at all, that I saw), or Monster Boy, or the alien (same race as the Green Lantern Salakk?) Dr. Fate. (Gold Lantern was really the least interesting one, to me.)

And yet, not so much.

Wow. I COMPLETELY forgot about Dr. Fate.

I like the visual of a spellcaster with four arms, and would love to see how he could possibly cast two spells at once. (Since Slyggians, IIRC, are also supposed to be geniuses compared to humans, and super good at multitasking due to their brain structure, although, at least if Salakk was any indication, somewhat uncreative and 'by the book', which would make an interesting limitation for a spellcaster, being stuck in a rut and using spells in a rote manner, and resisting the idea of using a spell for other than it's intended purpose, or using magic from less precise and methodical traditions.)