Legion World Forums LEGION CLUBHOUSE The Legion of Super-Heroes 15 years later - Rereading the Reboot...

Although I risk being tarred and feathered for saying so, I thought the merged Wildfire thing was interesting. It seemed that with Traid, Apparition, Wildfire (& others I can't recall) TPTB were exploring personal duality that worked so well with charaters like Batman. The best characterization of the first year of the reboot was Triad, IMHO. Since the title was still written in a very basic manner it worked well that Luornu's personalities manifested physically. Of course, all this duality (& triplicity), with all it's potential for development of depth, ultimately was Kokoed out.

Cool SLK, just do so. I did have a look at the covers of my missing issues at comicbookdb.com, and so I learned that after the Dark Circle thing, which was a multiparter, there was another Mordru story and another Fatal Five story. The only things I would be really interested in though were the popping up of Charma and Kono (one of my personal 5YL favorites). LSH seems to have had constant change of artists. Well, probably the loss of Jason Armstrong after such a short time was not entirely coincidental.

I do own Legends of the Legion #1, Ultra Boys story, but as I stated before, I am not happy with Todd naucks art. I also do have the Spiderboy Oneshot, but that's an Amalgam book, I store those in an entirely different folder I also found out that I do have a Green Lantern book where the Legion appeared AFTER their 20th century stint. Hm, how did that come to happen? Guess I have to just read it It's a German translation by the way, so here we have a further one of those very rare German Legion appearances. Wonder how the German Green Lantern fans did think about that strange team from the 30th century back then...

Unlimited Access #2 sounds kind of funny though. I do have a pretty large collection of X-Men books as well, so it should be a must-search book for me

Eh? Armstrong did a 15-page backup in #100, then #101-108 (#102 shared with Todd Nauck). #109 is a fill-in (both writer and artist, so I suspect it and the Legionnaires issue of the same month were inventory stories). Then Kolins comes on and does #110-115 & #117-121 (#116 is a fill-in by Keron Grant). Then DnA & Coipel come in and take over.

Two artists and a couple of one-off fill-ins over the course of 21 issues is hardly a "constant" change of artists. Take a look at Agents of Atlas v2 if you want to see what that looks like.

Comparing it to 3 1/2 years of Moder and nearly 5 years of Moy doing the books, it was a lot of change. Of course, there are books where there's still more change going on, especially nowadays when a new artist seems to be on most books every six months, but it was a considerable higher amount of change nonetheless.

The Legion following the big issues #100 was actually pretty decent. The stories focused on individuals or small groups of Legionnaires. The stories also had purpose as they were building to the Dark Circle storyline.

The Ferro story (Legionnaires #59) stands out as my favorite of this stretch. Ferro is debating on whether or not to have a surgery that will leave him looking beautiful but also leave him permanently in iron form.

Armstrong's art on LSH was not really to my liking. It's very cartoony. Plus he showed very little creativity in designing aliens, a must for any Legion artist.

The biggest disappointment is what the creative teams did with the "Fires of Creation" storyline. What could have been a fascinating mystery was merely a plot device used to arbitrarily alter some personalities. Seriously, who needs character development? Just stare into this giant thingamajig and start acting differently.

Next up - Time Trapper 2-parter and Dark Circle Rising. I can't remember anything from that one except that I really really hated it.

I just started rereading DnA today. Wow - i have to say that it's creepy how the mood of the book was changed within one single issue. DnA introduced the Blight to explain how everything changed, but the most obvious element which made this book so much more interesting was Olivier Coipiels artwork. Wow! What a difference to Moder, Moy or Armstrong! Can't speak for Scot Kolins' art but I guess it must have been quite a shock for the few loyal Reboot fans back then when their world was shattered with the beginning of "Legion of the Damned"... gone was the world where Lori Morning and Koko could save the day

Just have to write this down even though I just read the first two issues today. It's stunning what an effect this new style had on the book - and even though I remember I liked the book a lot back in 2000, I - again - can't recall any important plot elements. So this should be fun rereading.

By the way, SLK, feel free to carry on bridging the gap of the issues preceding DnA. I'm still curious what exactly happened in those (hmmmmmm, how did Monstress turn orange, I wonder... )

She (Monstress) turned orange during a previous issue of Element Lad touching her. And it manifested later. Oh i miss her.

Okay, I'm through with "Legion of the Damned" and "Widening Rifts". I am having a lot of thoughts about these two connected storylines, so I'll try to focus them.

I already stated my first impressions. The atmosphere I mentioned, though, is only there when Coipiel does the artwork. In Widening Rifts, de Kraker (well done) and Unzieta (not so well done) jumped in to cover Coipiel, and I really thought those issues did lack something special. As for the change of tone, it's really astonishing that DnA did "5YL" all over again - only in this case, it was just "one month later", and the story was wrapped up much quicker. My personal feeling is that the Blight was defeated a little bit too quickly considering the fact that it totally changed the earth within a month. The story is solid, but I rather like the slow approach taken in 5YL where it took three years in real time to defeat the Dominators.

Another thing I really realized was that hardly anything had changed in those two years I skipped reading. I mean, obviously, Kid Quantum II, Karate Kid and Thunder joined the Legion, the latter already leaving again in "Widening Rifts". Monstress grew orange, and Brainy got an update and, for gods sake, lost Koko. And there was a rather convoluted new Wildfire whom DnA obviously liked more than other characters they started to write out of the story.

How did it happen back than that DnA were given free reign over the Reboot Legion? Did the editors say, "hey DnA, this series sucks hard for a few years now, you can take any Legionnaire you want and do anything like with them - as long as it's a thrilling story. Dark and gritty? Ahhh, we've been there, but why not?"

As for the story itself, the Blight was well done - only a little too quick - while Widening Rifts was a little bit annoying, seeing the LSH and the politicians struggling AGAIN. And McCauley being the bad guy AGAIN. This was not so original.

But the story was only a vehicle to get to Legion Lost/Worlds. I'm really looking forward to rereading those now...

By the way, I am skipping "Legion/Titans - Universe Ablaze" cause I read that one just last year. Took me nearly a decade to finally hunt down that last issue. I really liked that series, especially the artwork. As the Titans used to be my second favorite team, this book was a no-brainer to me, and I did not have any major complaints about it. Certainly some book I will have fun reading someday - just not now as I really want to get into Legion Lost.

To me, there's a big difference between DnA's run and the 5YL run, and it's this: in the 5YL comics, the Legionnaires are still clearly good guys, but they've lost their innocence. That's not true of the DnA run; DnA's Legionnaires are just as innocent as they ever were. I don't see those comics as dark and gritty at all. Serious, sure, and the menaces they face are quite formidable, but the description "dark and gritty" includes a moral darkandgrittiness that's entirely absent from DnA's Legionnaires.

One can point to the Blighted Legionnaires or to what happened to Element Lad as an example of that kind of corruption of character, but I wouldn't. It's obviously a very different kind of thing from what happens to Sun Boy in 5YL. It's like the difference between high fantasy and low fantasy.

The question you should ask yourself until an interview with DnA appears (with their legion years being discussed)is was that Really McCauley or was that Ra's Ah Gul?

I agree with Matt. It was dark yes gritty but it wasn't as insidnerary as the 5 year was.

We didn't have any that i remember central or supporting cast die. We were defintely in a dark place where we were wondering ...could the legion make it this time. ANd it certainly for this version of the legion was the most dangerous foes they ever faced. But they were united as a team. The only time the legion of the 5 year gap came together was to hunt for coz.
I think there was confirmation that the book was in serious danger of cancelation and DnA were hired to shake things up because sales were falling...and the book was creatively wise stale in some parts. Which lead to the eventual cancellation of Legion of Super Heroes and Legionnaires. Only to return after Legion Lost and Legion Worlds was The Legion.

I hadn't thought of the DnA Legion as being analogous to the 5YL Legion. Although, as Matthew points out, there are significant differences, I can see a correlation: Both arcs represented a significant departure from previous story lines, and, in both cases, the departure took the form of "darker" stories in which our heroes struggled (and usually lost) against overwhelming forces.

The comparison doesn't have to begin (or end?) with the corruption of Sun Boy/Element Lad. In both cases, that's only one part of a much larger transformation. Even Coipel's art could be analogous to Giffen's in that it reflected a much gritter view than the previously clean-and-neat future to which fans were accustomed. (Coipel's art, though, was much easier to follow than Giffen's.)

Well, both Live Wire and Element Lad died (notwithstanding their abominable resurrection as "Jarth" later on), as did Monstress.

During LEGION LOST, the team was not united. Several members were lost in another galaxy and the rest of the team had disbanded in their absence.

I agree. I wrote this blogpost once comparing Legion Lost to another famous Legion storyline.

Very insightful post, Matthew. I knew there were similarities between LOST and the earlier story, but I'd never analyzed it. The parallels are eerie, particularly with the DC Comics Presents story thrown in.

Of course the DnA run is not half as "dark and gritty" as 5YL - but I certainly feel that it's dark, and considering the fact that the Rebootbefore was mostly "light" - sometimes bordering on childish and ridiculous - the felt difference between Reboot before and after the Blight is certainly similar to the difference between Levitz Legion and 5YL.

I did not yet read Legion Lost again, my first impressions did only refer to Legion of the Damned. But Coipiels artwork alone feels very "dark", as did Giffens/Pearsons on 5YL, so I guess a lot of this impression is based on the artwork.

I really love Coipels work now but it took a lot of getting used to at the time!

I think he might have put some readers off.

The DnA and Coipel run was my favourite Legion era since Levitz so I think it's a shame it ended the way it did.

I think Levitz'll write a great Gates.

Wildfire was always one of my favorite characters. The stubborn refusal of Giffen, Bierbaum & co. to divulge what happened to him during their run downright irritating. I thought the concept behind the re-boot version of the character was inept, but frankly I was just happy to have him back.

I thought for the most part the reboot Legion worked for me, or could have worked, but it seemed like whenever they were getting on track they immediately derailed themselves. When the first big story arc that essentially took up most of the first two years after the reboot came to a conclusion in LSH #80, I was hooked. This was something recognizable to me as the Legion, and IMMEDIATELY the team was partially dismantled. Andromeda was hastily written out, totally destroying the relationship angle with Brainy, half the team got stranded in the 20th century, and Projectra was re-imagined as a giant snake (still one of the most inane things I've ever seen in any comic). It wasn't until well into Abnett & Lanning's run that they got back the momentum that was lost. And about a month after that, after I said to myself "OK, the Legion is back to being the Legion, I'm interested and involved and I bloody CARE about them again like I used to," DnA leave, the book gets cancelled with major plotlines left unresolved (that bugs me most of all, and the one question I'd like to get an answer from from somebody at DC: why couldn't you at least make a half-ass attempt at resolving the remaining plotlines? How am I supposed to feel when I've come back every month and bought your title and you just stop it abruptly without any kind of resolution? Do you not see how that could give us a severe disinclination to support any future incarnation of the Legion, since we now have an established track record of leaving us hanging? OK, that's three questions...), and what should have been a Legion dream team of Waid and Kitson come up with the most unrecognizable and implausible take on the Legion ever published. The book looked great, and the stories were not awful or "mailed in" in any way, at least not at first. But it wasn't the Legion. The "all adults suck" premise was unsustainable over the long haul, the characters called themselves Ultra Boy and Light Lass and Phantom Girl, but they were complete strangers to me, and not people I particularly wanted to get to know.


And then Jim Shooter comes along, and in his very first issue, without rebooting a damn thing, delivers something that felt more like the Legion I grew up with than anything I'd seen in literally decades. The only thing that surprised me was that DC let it go all the way to issue #50 before pulling the plug. That they pulled the plug, and did so with major plotlines left unresolved, were not only NOT surprising to me, they were things I assumed would happen as soon as I realized I liked what Shooter was doing. This is probably why I'm not reading or planning to read, any new Legion material that comes out. I stuck with it through so many inexcusable and inept editorial miscues, and every time I thought my faith was going to be rewarded some new stupidity came out of left field and ruined it. There is absolutely no evidence that would suggest that this established pattern of heartbreak is not going to continue. I'm at the point where I think no Legion at all might be better than any Legion DC would put out today.

Well said, Laszlo. After rereading large parts of the Reboot, the decision to do the "eat it grandpa" nonsense makes even less sense. You can always eliminate mistakes (like Sneckie), you don't have to reboot it again - you can work with what you have like Shooter showed with his short Threeboot run.

Ah, anyway, I'm halfway through with Legion Lost, I have to say that I like it. Again. After the prelude with Legion of the Damned, this is the main event. It's very convincing with its strong SciFi atmosphere. The team is small, and its members are written with a much more mature approach. Even corny members like Monstress are making sense now, her annoying fashion sense and her constant "oh isn't he handsome" drivel being downtoned by many levels.

I also like the way that each issue is presented from a different persons point of view: #1 by Shikari, #2 by Monstress, #3 by Kid Quantum, #4 by Saturn Girl, #5 by Brainiac and the beginning of #6 by Umbra. That's another plus for characterisation. Already knowing the ending, I also am constantly searching for hints considering Element Lads and Tinyas fate. And I'm really finding lots of tidbits which allude to Saturn Girls and Tinyas connection, though I found it hard to believe how Tinya could save the situation with those quantum parasites in #4 when she was actually not even there but just a projection c/o Imra...

Considering the fact that the Legion was stuck in a totally new universe, I think it wasa little rushed to finish this storyline after only 12 issues. The possibilities to explore were limitless, and the smaller team and the Science Fiction content were a good way to lure new readers in. I would have liked the story to move a little slower - you don't have to make seven seasons out of it like Voyager, but given more time, you can develop more interesting subplots and further deepen the characterisation. Ah well, this is why I like 5YL and Babylon 5 and Lost.... :-)

One thing I did not like was that there was a guest penciller in #4 and #6. It's not that Alixe was bad, but Coipiels art just makes the story fly, and it's sad that he did not manage to do the book more regularly considering that he was already taken of the Threeparter "Widening Rifts". But that's just a minor complaint. I really do feel that "Legion Lost" catapulted the Reboot Legion to a totally new level, and I'm really looking forward to rereading the rest of the DnA run.

There was an awful lot to like in DnA's run. I was pleased to see the revival of the Legion Academy, "Sneckie" turned into a character that I actually found interesting (in order to keep her from dying she had to be infused with human DNA, which gave her a much more humanlike appearance, which she hated, and which made her a bit surly, which was a hell of a lot more interesting than the syrupy "I love everybody" attitude she used to have), and very good storylines with Darkseid and Universo. There's no way I can be convinced that something couldn't have been done with this continuity and that another reboot of any sort was warranted, especially the stinkbomb that Waid delivered...

I completely agree!

DnA did really good work in turning a doomed series into a viable one.

Letting Waid do his own reboot was just lazy. And I couldn't believe it when Shooter said they offered him a reboot too!

If he'd said yes then the Legion would be in even worse shape than Hawkman.

At least now things seem to be going in a better direction...

Legion Lost all in all was a a pleasant read again the second time around. It managed to go through with its concept - each issue spotlighting a different character - and told a decent story, though the ending was a little bit too "cosmic entities battling something out" like in the final issue. Anti-Monitor, Darkseid, you name the demigod of the day, Jan Arrah and the Omnipaghos merging was not my favorite kind of story ending.

I'm also having trouble how such a godlike creature like Jan had become can be beaten by a bunch of regular superheroes. I mean, Jan did kill Monstress with but a thought - why did he let the others live to beat him?

Then there was this issue with Wildfire destroying all the progeny ships - of course without killing anybody because he just targeted the power units... this kind of naiveté reminds me of the pre-DnA times, I mean, even if you manage to control the damage to certain decks of a spaceship, won't they soon run out of air and food and everything in the middle of outer space??? Don't get me wrong, I like the non-killing code of the Legion, but when you as a writer are desperately trying to keep it up in a space war, it's a little stretching credibility here.

Okay, Legion Lost was fun, but watching it more closely, I found some problems similar to those troubling the sooner Reboot. The big difference was in the darker atmosphere, which was largely due to Coipiels artwork - though he only did 9 of 12 issues. The cheesiness factor was reduced by the absence of characters like Lori Morning and Sneckie and the toning down of Monstress. The introduction of a nice new character (Shikari) and the turning bad/mad/god of another team member gave the book new power. So without being genius, Legion Lost altered course for the Legion, giving the Reboot some further years which it probably would not have been granted without this new direction.

I wonder whether more people would have been more accepting of Monstress if she'd had unique powers. I know I would have tolerated her sweet personality more if she'd brought something more unique to the team in terms of strategy. And I know a lot of people hated her personality.

As for Magno, I liked how they gave him further purpose by later on adding him to the Legion's support staff. He got a lot more backbone then.

Have to agree. The Legion was portrayed as together, decisive, and united, and while members like Ferro had their issues, it didn't paralyze them from action. Chuck and Tenzil got some screen time, and I like the scene where Gates and Ferro bonded over their looks (and GAtes shedding a tear was priceless!)

Absolutely! It tread the fine line perfectly, not too youth-oriented that I couldn't read it without cringing, but not so complex that a kid couldn't enjoy it. The Legionnaires were perfect role models for younger readers, not perfect people but people who were doing their best... not to mention squeezing two succinct stories in one issue, as opposed to one story in six issues.

Part of the problem I have with the current, Adult Legion is just that... that they're adults (the fact that they're adults who yell at each other all the time, throw tantrums and generally act like jerks is just adding insult to injury). While that's fine for us adult readers, it's probably not something a youth is going to enjoy.

Young readers, I believe, enjoy reading about teenagers, people they can relate to. Reading about old married couples with kids who aren't getting along, well, that's like reading the Legion of Super Parents... kinda like expecting us to enjoy reading about the Legion if they were twenty or thirty years older than they are now with their various health and relationship problems.

I'd love for there to be two Legion titles again, one with the modern Legion for the older crowd, and a younger Legion, a Legion just starting out, with modernized 60s-styled "classic" Untold Tales.