These characters have figured into my fanfics in the past.
It is my conceit that many of these Rejects were originally members of the first Legion Academy.
Rann AntarWhite-blond, curly-haired Rann Antar of Earth was a brilliant young chemist. Before the age of eighteen, he had developed a chemical formula with the ability to temporarily increase the weight of feathers. A few years later, after graduating from Metropolis University, he joined Tao Chemical Corporation on Phlon.
There, he developed a potion able to make eggs square, and another which separated white milk into its component colors. The market for square eggs and pastel-hued milk was small, but Rann earned a large bonus with his line of Tonsorial Tonics, one sip of which can trim or curl or your hair, change its color, or even regrow it.
Now middle-aged, Mr. Antar still lives on Phlon, and currently holds the position of Senior Vice-President in the Marketing Department of Tao Chemical. He and his wife Lanna have two children and one grandchild.
Green BoyEarth strictly enforces the United Planet policy forbidding scientists from using family members as experimental subjects. The teen-aged Boyd Green of Londonopolis, however, experimented on himself. Injecting himself with strange chemicals, he was able to give himself the power to turn any object temporarily green. Not only was his power of dubious value, he had some difficulty controlling it.
After leaving the Legion Academy, Boyd, still obsessed with gaining super-powers, experimented with the chemicals which gave Bouncing Boy, Invisible Kid, and Elastic Lad their powers. (Elasticizing serum, Norgine, and Gingold)
The combination of chemicals put Boyd in hospital for several months, as doctors attempted to ameliorate the effects. When finally released, Boyd was several inches taller, and covered with wooly green fur. He continued to grow, eventually reaching nearly eight feet in height. During this period, he moved from Londonopolis out into the more sparsely populated English countryside for his own comfort, and the comfort of those around him.
He was discovered again by the media in his mid-thirties, and had a brief couple of years as something of a celebrity, the “Green Man of the Shire”. He actually set aside a decent amount of credits from chat-show appearances and celebrity endorsements. During this period he met and married the supermodel and holo-actress, An Byth. The marriage was short-lived.
He still lives on his modest estate in Monmouthshire in Wales. Although he is still a giant, his fur and curly beard and hair are more gray than green.
Aside: There was evidently a period in the mid-2950’s when it was popular among young teens throughout the United Planets to play with super-chemistry sets.
Camera EyeOutis Neeman is a native of the planet Polyphemus, Planet of the Cyclopes, a world of genetically modified humans. Nearly all the Polyphemine have some sort of metahuman ability, usually related to optics.
Outis has a literal photographic memory, allowing him to project ‘movies’ of anything he has ever seen. For example, if he watches a holo-vid show, he can replay it entire, minus the sound.
During his application to the Legion, a fellow applicant, Boyd Green, lost control of his powers, and unintentionally turned Outis himself green. Unable to reverse the effect, he assured Outis that the change was only temporary, as it had been in every case before. But in this case, the change was permanent.
While his application to the Legion was rejected, he trained at the Legion Academy for some time, during which he was convinced that his unusual power would serve him well in the business of private investigation.
Renting a small space in downtown Metropolis, he hung up his ‘shingle’ as Outis Neeman, Private Eye. Some people considered it a joke.
One of his clients had hired Outis suspecting her husband was unfaithful to her. He found evidence in the affirmative, and she divorced him. She pointed out that his natural appearance-- luminous, bright green skin, and single eye-- might make him conspicuous as a private investigator, and suggested he purchase a Zyzan Holographic Cloak to disguise himself. He procured one.
Now able to roam Metropolis in a variety of guises undetected, Outis has become a prominent investigator, and has formed a business relationship with a couple of insurance companies.
Over the Intergalactic Net, he met a nice cyclopean girl from back on Polyphemus. They hit it off, and were married. They now share an apartment on the floor above his office in a skyscraper in downtown Metropolis.
PolecatDafe Meron is a Terran mutant from Earth, having been born on the northern African Continent on the border of the Mediterranean Sea. His pale skin, white forelock, and peculiar spongy ‘horns’. His ‘horns’ had the ability to emit a foul, repulsive odor. Even when he did not use this power, there was a certain amount of ‘leakage’. This led to a childhood filled with teasing, derision and rejection. He was nicknamed ‘polecat’. It looked like he would be leading a lonely life.
When he learned the Legion of Super-Heroes, he thought he might have finally found a usefulness for his odd power. Calling himself Polecat, he tried out for the Legion, but was rejected.
Although this was at the time when Command Kid was the sole ‘Legionnaire’, when the real Legion was restored, Dafe was invited to the Academy. There he experienced the same isolation and rejection he had experienced throughout his life,
After graduation he applied to the Science Police, was rejected, and eventually got a job working for a private security company. Generally his stations were outposts like Antarctica and the dark side of the Moon.
In his mid-thirties, he answered an advertisement for a companion to the centuries-old Kryptonian hermit Nam-Ek the Rondor Man, who lives in exile in the primeval forests of Daxam.
They actually are some comfort and company to one another, although occasionally one or the other will go on a walkabout, as too much time together begins to get on anyone’s nerves.
Calamity KingThings always seemed to go wrong for E. Davis Ester of Touston. Unbeknownst to him, he was a metahuman who generated a low-level improbability field at all times, the effect of which was to cause physical and mental stress to all things and beings around him. This led to physical and mental ‘stress fractures’ which his friends and family interpreted as ‘bad luck’.
After receiving a proper diagnosis for his medical condition, Davis found that with practice he was able to focus and intensify his ‘calamity’ powers, breaking and shattering what he willed.
He was rejected from the Legion for lack of control, perhaps inevitable due to the random factor of his powers.
Nevertheless, he was invited to the Legion Academy. Although he applied himself, he never gained better control of his powers, and was responsible for some near-disasters.
Life was difficult for Davis as an adult. Mostly, he lived on the U.P. Stipend. He received a job offer from a demolition contractor, but was unable to sufficiently focus his power to not affect adjacent buildings.
Life was expensive. His apartments and possessions were constantly in need of repair. Desperate for credits, he tortuously saved up a bit, and went to Ventura, the Gamblers Planet.
It turned out to be the first good thing that happened in his life. Although he did not win big-- in fact, did not have a chance to gamble at all-- his presence so damaged various Chance Machines (many of which were powered by quantum fluctuations) that he was evicted from the planet, and paid a large monthly remittance, revocable if he ever returned.
Using this windfall, Davis hired Daxamite and Coluan medical experts to attempt to suppress his metagenetic expression. It was difficult, as medical probes and equipment kept breaking down, as did several of the nurses who had close contact with him.
In the end, his condition proved incurable, but manageable. He needs to take custom medication daily to keep his ‘jinx’ power in check, but at least the Autochef® does not need repair every two weeks.
He never married or had children, fearing he might pass on his metagene, which might present as something even worse.
Davis now lives in a modest apartment in Metropolis, still supported by the Venturan remittance, and spends his days drawing and painting, creating bad art. He signs his pieces ‘Mr. E.’ He is considering branching out into bad sculpture and pottery.
In the Earth-K paracosm, his powers interfere with Matter-Eater Lad’s residual Miracle Machine energies, transforming Tenzil and Eve’s daughter into
Improbability Lass.
The Dynamo KidChubby, Charlie-Brown-ish Wil Warner was a Daily Planet Cub Reporter, and had a great idea. A piece on the Legion of Super-Heroes, from the inside, as a member! “I Was a Super-Legionnaire For One Week”.Unfortunately, he had no super-powers. However, assisted by his unscrupulous editor, he donned a small tesla generator, and blew up a Daily Planet flying billboard equipped with a small remote-controlled bomb at his Legion Try-Out. They figured he could remain undetected by the teens for at least a week.
Saturn Girl easily detected the clumsy deception, and Wil never got his week with the Legion.
Wil appears boorish, rude, and boastful during his tryout, but this was only because this is how he believed a super-hero would behave.
The real Wil himself is actually fairly well-mannered and polite, a likable enough character who can often get interviewees to share things they later regret.
In one of those hilarious pranks that the young Legion was famous for, they invited him to attend the Legion Academy, and do a piece on Legion training ‘from the inside’. The Legion Academy Instructor leaned particularly hard on him, and his training was both physically and mentally brutal.
Rather than holding this against the Legionnaires, Wil gained a new respect for the Legion, often writing editorials in their favor when the Legion fell into disfavor with the general public.
He maintained a relatively close relationship for years with Chuck Taine. They used to go out for tacos together.
Wil studied journalism at Metropolis University, and has occasionally returned to moonlight as an instructor there himself.
The elder Wil Warner is a heavy-set, balding editor and columnist, still working for the Daily Planet after all these years. Most of his opinions are in opposition to the speciesists in government left over from the Niedrigh era.
He married one Kay Plummer, a newspaperwoman, simultaneously poaching her for the Daily Planet from the Daily Sentinel. They have a teen-aged daughter, Laurel, who wants to grow up to be a reporter just like her parents.
The MessThe Alfred-E.-Neumanish Meyer Qayd remained at the Legion Academy only a short time, finding the required physical exertion and studies of chemistry, physics, criminal science, and psychology tiring.
Feeling his calling was more to the dark side, and with Tarik the Mute’s criminal college disbanded, he attempted to develop and expand his power of attracting dirt, rubbish, and filth. Variously taking the names Dust Devil, Dust Demon, Compost King, and the Living Rubbish Heap, he has operated as a small-time criminal, in and out of prison for many years, resistant to standard psychological reprogramming.
He was never really able to link up with a group, such as the Legion of Super-Villains, because he is so noisome to have around.
He is currently serving yet another prison sentence on Maldad, a small moon in the Alpha Antliae system used for low-level, low-priority, and mostly harmless criminals.
http://www.legionworld.net/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=904164#Post904164Lester SpiffanyLester tried his hand at super-villainy, as the Gem Master, collecting a variety of magical gems. In one episode I relate, he faced off against Chip, the parthenogenetic son of Blok.
https://www.legionworld.net/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=888289#Post888289Command KidJeem Rehtu has two alternate futures in my fanfics. On Earth-K2, he is the happily married father of twelve, living with his wife Jhina on Pretzor. He is the father of Aquaboy, an applicant to the Super-Hero Club.
On Earth-K1, he and his wife are demon hunters.
https://www.legionworld.net/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=943178#Post943178