Legion World Forums LEGION CLUBHOUSE The Legion of Super-Heroes Long Live the Legion! Popular Character You Never Really Cared About

I love Quislet! Even though I think most of the Baxter series is only so-so, he's definitely on of the good things about that book. A character who really becomes a super-hero for the fun of it, and is totally unencumbered by annoying pathos and crap! What's not to love?

Gear-was it ever popular?
Element Lad. It seemed to me that he should have been much much more powerful than he was, but he's too nice of a guy to ever really hurt anyone. Who needs RJ Brande when you have an alchemist, but he's too nice of a guy to make money that he didn't earn. And what's with hair and the pink shirt and the white arm rings? E for effeminate.

Tromium is a woman.

While I like all the characters to some extent, there have definitely been some that are further down my radar.

For fun, here they are broken down into wacky categories:

Icky Aliens

I always felt Tellus would have been best served with tartar sauce. Blok needed to do something to put himself out there more. I would have really liked to have seen a Levitz-era "Blok, Brin and Mysa out on the town" tale. The funny-animal Sneckie was insulting, although DnA's Snakejectra had quite an amazing visual.

Honkys-male

Magnetic Kid wasn't offed quick enough for me. I live for the next time Tharok slaps the crap out of Cosmic Boy.

Honkys-female

I never missed Phantom Girl during the 5YL stories (although one could argue this is because she was portrayed much better over in L.E.G.I.O.N. at the time)

Brothas-French descent

Sacre Bleu! I really disliked the idea of my precious Tyroc being dumped for that funny-talkin' upstart Jacques Foccart. C'est sucky! Although ole Jacquey later became a fave during the 5YL stories. D'accord!

Brothas from another planet

WaKboot Star Boy. He's sure not to confuse anyone.


Honestly, I really do like them all (to varying degrees) and don't begrudge any of them appearing at anytime!

I call him "Cupcake Head." :giggle:

Seriously, is there a more blatant attempt on early 80s DC's part to replicate Marvel's early 80s X-Men? :rolleyes:

(And don't anyone say New Teen Titans. I'm way ahead of ya.)

(Besides, New Teen Titans was actually...you know...GOOD. Just my opinion.)

Dare I say it?

Cosmic Boy. The Legion's version of Cyclops of the X-Men. I find that type of character extremely boring.

The only moments where he's been remotely interesting is when he's totally crazy or a total jerk.

Ligth Lass or Ligthning Lass, I don't care.
She must died in the LSV saga, in the place of Karate Kid.

Thunder.
Monstress (Dead for good)
Kono
Impulse (Kent Shakespeare)
Gates (I'm Veilmist fan)
Gear
Kid Quantum (The brothers)
XS
Kinetix
Magno
Star Boy III

In a way, I find characters like Wildfire or Dawnstar, who are more jerk-ish or 'complain-y' to work extremely well with characters like Cosmic Boy or Colossal Boy, who some might say are boring (or as I see them: confident, somewhat calm and classically heroic). That mix of dynamics works extremely well. Its only when you mix all of one group together that it gets either boring (yawn--the three founders again??? ugh) or annoying (like the ultra angsty X-Men of the early 90's or various times in Legion history in the last fifteen years). So a lot of what is appealing about these characters is who they're interacting with and what situations they're in.

I really do love most of the Legion characters (including villains, walk-ons and supporting characters). But like Lash, I have a few (listed earlier in the thread) that I'm not all that into.

And jillikers, I like Invisible Kid II . I'd say I like all versions of various Invisible Kid's in all eras except hyper-annoying WAK Threeboot Invisible Kid, who hopefully Shooter provides a gruesome death to

I agree ultimately that it's the mix of characters that ultimately makes the Legion appealing. Even though I generally don't care for the angsty or arrogant jerk characters, their interaction with the classically heroic or eccentric but confident or fun-loving characters does make them more interesting.

And, crap! Lash's post reminds me how much I miss Tyroc!

Oh, come on. My s**t list still leaves 30 Legionnaires more or less, not to mention maybe a dozen favorite supporting players and villains I like as much as or better than some core team members. (I'd take Insect Queen or Mekt over Ultra Boy, Colossal Boy, Karate Kid, Dawnstar and Blok all rolled into one.)

40 plus characters I've enjoyed over the years are sufficient to make the Legion worth "bothering" with, save for a couple of black hole periods when *none* of the characters appealed to me.

Well speaking of Tyroc I don't care for him at all. I did like him in v4 though. I just don't consider him a "popular" character.

You all know my dislike for Bouncing Boy, Matter Eater Lad and Insect Queen. And for the record it's their powers I don't care for...the characters I like.

Jacques rocks btw!

I liked Princess Projectra (and Sensor Girl). I liked Sensor (the snake). I hated Snakejectra! I felt it was an attempt to please those who liked Projectra but hated Sensor and those who liked Sensor. In the end it was a compromise that would please no one. IMHO

Actually there are quite a lot of people who like the semi-human version of Sensor snake both because of her appearance and because of the dynamics of her character. I, for one, liked the later version better than the "snake".

The human-snake version of Sensor was visually stunning, but I was disappointed that so little was done with her character. She became a reverse-Thing, bitterly upset over the fact that she had gone through the transformation. The "Sneckie" persona was more regal and accepting; I thought that she would have reacted differently, or at least not let her feelings get in the way of her duties as a Legionnaire.

As with much of DnA's character development, Sensor got shoved aside in favor of the next big story arc.

The message I got from Sensor's transformation from snake into bizarre-snake-person-with-inexplicable-breasts-and-hips, especially coming so soon (relatively speaking) after Monstress's death, is that DnA and/or DC believed that their readers wouldn't accept any female character who wasn't arguably sexy.

Since then, I've heard nothing from Legion fans to make me believe that DnA and/or DC were wrong.

I used to feel that way too, until I read the Adventure Era story where Jo pretended to be a former criminal to trap some bad guys. Then I gained a new appreciation for him too post Zero Hour, after Tinya died up to before Legion Lost. He seemed more mature and kind of cool - the time when he went to the soup kitchen with Gates was priceless, and I like how he handled Tinya then.

Course, DNA made him such a panel hog that I started to grow indifferent to him again.

And the 3Boot version completely ruined him for me. Now I actively loathe him, and the only other Legionnaire who shares that honor is Atmos. It's that bad. Sprocking violent hotheaded arrogant jerk.

Hear, hear.

While there have never been periods where I've not been thrilled by any of the characters (even now, I'm liking 3Boot Ayla, Tasmia, Salu and Brainy), I'd gladly trade Blok, Colossal Boy, Sun Boy and Tellus for Nightwind and Infectious Lass. Well, ok, if they write Colossal Boy as post Zero Hour Leviathan then I'd keep him on the list too.

If there's any place that'll prove you're wrong, I think it's here. I have a soft spot for Monstress, and appreciated pre-Snakejectra Sensor. And my hatred for Terrorform Zoe stemmed from the fact that they changed an interesting (for me) character with an interesting personality and powers into that horrible, boring and personality-less monstrosity.

Yeah, Quislet is a lot higher up on my list than Blok or Tellus are, but I didn't have enough of a dose of him/it to really form much of a favorable opinion.

Yeah, Kinetix went downhill as a character after her transformation.

I don't believe people didn't accept Sneckie because she wasn't sexy in her snake form. If I remember correctly many didn't like the change from the human Sensor/Projectra to a snake. As a snake she was ok, but a snake with artificial sticks for arms was just plain ugly.
It's true they didn't have the time to develop the semi-human, and visually beautiful, Sensor. It was a very original idea to have a character *we* consider beautiful feel ugly and deformed. It's the "ugly duckling" motif with a twist, that could have been used in many and interesting ways.

As for "sexiness" in female characters? I found Monstress quite interesting *and* sexy, in her own way.

Sensor being a snake was an unforgivable change for me that always kept me from supporting the reboot fully. DnA's 'change' felt dissapointing more than anything else. But its all been said before 1,000 times. "If there was a new character that was a snake, that would be cool, but why change Projectra so drastically"? Especially after she had such a dramatic role at the end of Levtiz's run and then pretty much was never around thereafter (one great story aside). They could have reintroduced her and really played to that.

But jeepers, I like spiders and snakes and insects and Tellus and Blok and monsters and other cool stuff. Loved Strata. I'd have accepted one of those male or female...just not replacing a character I already know. Ultimately, that's where the reboot lost my support completely, in those little moments.

See, I think the idea behind the reboot and the idea behind reintroducing Projectra as a snake was that we are re-establishing continuity but we aren't just retelling the Adventure stories, there will be twists.

It was what Waid & Kitson did with Star Boy.

I can see that it (Projectra being a snake) didn't work for some people.

wha-wha-WHAT?!?!

Now I just want to cry...

I never particularly cared about Superboy or Saturn Girl myself.

I think Kinetix went downhill after the Anomaly story when she became zombie-like.

Prior to that she was a strong and assertive female character. I think being a strong and assertive female made her a target for what happened to her.

Hmm, yeah, I guess you're right. I wish she had been part of the 3boot Legion in her original form.