Legion World Forums LEGION CLUBHOUSE The Legion of Super-Heroes Kinetix

Green went better with her hair.

Jean Grey figured that out!

Kinetix definitely looked better in green... but since her, Jean Grey, Maxima, Mera (and whoever else I'm forgetting) are all redheads that the artists put in green I'd really like to see future red-headed characters in a different colour.

Good point. Even Spider-Girl's in a green tunic last I saw (although she's no longer a redhead, go figure.)

Gold goes well with red, and a dark blue outfit against flowing red hair might be neat. Alan Davis managed to make Looker pretty distinctive with the mass of red hair and purple leotard. (I don't recall, but I think Marvel's Medusa is also usually wearing purple...)

Medusa's royalty, so she wears purple one way or the other, and she never looked good in green for some reason.

I'd go with gold, I think.

I love the idea of animated creature chairs and mops and things running around Lallor.
I remember a fairy tale when I was a kid of a girl who learned how to clean up after herself when her fairygodmother animated all of the things in her cottage to talk to the kid and hit her over the head, etc. until she did the chores.


Also, they might run around breeding all sorts of stranges things!
The dish really COULD run away with the spoon!

In a word, No. Never liked her.

I would make her younger than the others if she joined in this universe, about the age that the founders were when they started the team.

Considering what happened with Pol, Cos would eb against her joining and would send her on BS missions to keep her safe.

Until one of those missions, leads her right to the Fatal Five. She holds her own until the rest of the Legion arrives.

If, somehow, the reboot universe survives, Thanot Saugin might become Kinetix 2.

I would rather start fresh with a Zoe from the retroboot universe.

If they could just reverse the Terrorform-ing, she would have been OK, I believe.

And her death by Superboy Prime (whom I despite) and absorption by Mordru is not irreversible either.

I agree that green looks best on her.

And I would rather Zoe Saugin, than anyone else taking the mantle.

I've been thinking about Kinetix after reading the "It's 2004" thread and Reboot's ideas for her, as well as Sarky's story outline in the "Legionnaires You Love" thread. Maybe Invisible Brainiac's love for the character has affected me to the point that I'm becoming a Kinetix devotee.

Kinetix wasn't my favourite by a long shot; too flighty, seeking power through mystical objects, although she had moments of reflection which were more endearing. When the Legion was split up under DnA, she joined the Science Police and, as we saw when she met M'Onel in Legion Worlds #1, hadn't changed. It almost seems that the writer was punishing her; you'd think that on joining the SPs, with all the experience and training that the Legion provided, she'd be given more important duties than getting coffee for everyone, even as a junior officer. Bring Zoe down a peg, was my impression.

It's curious that she is always described as "seeking power" or even "greedy for power", despite the added caveat that she means to do good. Brainiac 5 upbraids her for this in LSH #81 ("It seems the call of duty has little regard for your fanatical power lust"). One could easily level the same criticism at him, although he seeks scientific knowledge rather than mystical power. In fact, Kinetix could have been reframed as one seeking knowledge through mystical means. I think our society generally considers a quest for knowledge as more noble than seeking power (despite the Faust story), even if both lead to destruction.

Kinetix is the unsung hero of the Robotica story. She was the among the first transformed by hypertaxis (trying to save two reporters) and immediately used her new powers to help her team mates: warning them, advising them, saving M'onel's life. She had become something different (again), but didn't go off on an exploratory tangent; she remained devoted to helping the Legion - and Earth. Even as Robotica overtook her being, she warned Shvaughn Erin to get away, in one of the most sad and haunting panels of that story. In the end, it was Kinetix that enabled the Legion to get to Earth, essentially by sacrificing herself. She would have had no idea if she could return to human form if the Legion triumphed, or what would become of her if they failed. She did what was needed and what she could, in the moment, with no thought to her ultimate well-being.

The Robotica story ends with Computo transcending to a new state, all dark and petty emotions gone. I think the same should have been done with Kinetix. Her cumulative experiences with mysticism and Robotica should have given her gravitas, if not the enlightenment that Computo apparently achieved. However, she seldom appeared in the rest of the series, and then, only to utter a few Hulk-like observations.

In Lo3W, she is consumed by Mordru, a gruesome end, although not necessarily permanent. Sarcasm Kid proposed that she be restored, separated from Mordru, and left with a hatred of Mysa, blaming Mysa for abandoning her. That's a reasonable and compelling storyline, given the circumstances. Wouldn't something like that drive you a little mad, at the least? I would prefer that Kinetix never had been put in that position to begin with, but, had she been given greater serenity/insight/consciousness after the Robotica experience, she would be more likely to recover, find her balance, understand Mysa's position and transcend or dissipate the anger.

I am pleased to see my love of Kinetix rubbing off on you, FC! Good points that you have raised.

In the Hypertaxis storyline, she also rallies the other Terrorforms to prevent the Moon from crashing into the Earth.

In my fanfic, she is extracted from Mysa in much the same way that Sarky proposes: both she and Mordru come out at the same time, as Zoe cannot be restored without restoring Mordru. However, she is able to overcome her torment, and instead of being angry, she is grateful for the second chance at life. She also comes to terms with her power lust by realizing that she can do good AND be "perfected" even without wielding such awesome power.

There is precedent for that: In LSH v4 113, she pulls herself out of her post-Anomaly funk by deciding that the quest for power is not worth it, if it means losing herself and her family and friends. In Legionnaires 48-50 and LSH v4 121, she encounters the Emerald Eye without becoming enthralled by it. In Legionnaires 42, where Mysa restores her to her "human" form, she also reflects that the quest for power was not worth it.

She can, and has, learned from her mistakes.

Given the examples you list of her earlier moments of insight, it's all the more disappointing that DnA turned her into a cipher of a character. I hadn't even remembered that she was in the series after Robotica arc, so minimal was her presence, until I flipped through the following issues. It's peculiar, given their scifi approach, that the writers wouldn't have exploited her experience as part of machine kind and the implications of hypertaxis, even if they didn't like Zoe's mystical background.

Yes, that's a good point. There was a lot of potential growth for her if they had let her turn back to normal. And the mystical background was really confined to her origin; for the bulk of her history, her affinity for magic was ignored. Writers mostly focused on her telekinetic powers.

Her presence became even more unremarkable because DnA mostly ignored her original sassy, bubbly personality after she became a Terrorform. It's especially sad because they showed, in her very few pre-Terrorform appearances, that they had a good handle on her (Legion Worlds 1, Legion 4 and 6).