Legion World Forums LEGION CLUBHOUSE The Legion of Super-Heroes Long Live the Legion! Official LSH 3 Worlds Thread #5 out (FINALLY!! - spoilers)

I must add my enthusiasm to Lo3W #1. It was a lone time since I read about my favourite Legion.
I am really thrilled that Superman is tied so intricately to this Legion. Despite all the noted differences with the Levitz Legion, this is close enough. This story blows away the current LOSH comic for me.

I thought the definitions of Saturn Girl, Lightning Lad and Cosmic Boy as inspiration for Truth, Justice and the American Way quite a good correlation. Sure, you can interprete any other way, but Saturn Girl inspiring Truth makes a lot of sense given her telepathic nature. Cos inspiring American Way is a nice nod to him being a History buff, something established in the Levitz run.

I agree that RJ Brande's death gives it a symmetry but instead of it being the end of a dream, I see it as an affirmation of the Legion and spur for them to continue. After all, his last words were, "Don't you dare give up".

Could the redemption of Superboy Prime (if it happens) result in him going back into the time stream and reappearing just in time to take down the Anti-Monitor?

Can't wait for #2.
Long Live the Legions!

I really don't see any way possible for Superboy Prime to be redeemed...

If his Countdown appearance happened there is absolutely no way he can be redeemed. He murdered an entire Earth in Countdown pretty much with his bare hands. He killed every hero on it with his bare hands. IIRC He looked directly at a woman he knew was pregnant and fried her with his heat vision.

He actually double crossed the Anti-Monitor even...

I think he's pretty much the most iredeemable character in comics right now.


No way to redeem him from being a mass murderer unless he's wiped out of this reality or he undoes everything he's done somehow by erasing it from history.


...even if he sacrifices himself, he's still going to have commited far greater evil than he prevented.

hmm..
I love this conversation. MM may have just solved the puzzle. If SBPrime sacrifices his life for Supergirl's in CoIE would that be adequate redemption? That <strike>would</strike> could restore the missing past and eliminate the future where he was a mass murderer and maybe even inspire his past self to actually become a hero after all.

- ack - I should have known better, time travel paradoxes (paradoxie? paradie?) makes my head hurt.

Yikes! I didn't read any of that stuff, so all I really knew about was his Teen Titans slaughterfest (with the Pantha-block-knockage) and now this current appearance where he's killed 20,000 prison workers and the population of 31st century Smallville in the first issue.

As I said above, a heroic death is 'too good' for him. He's got 20,000 letters to bereaved survivors to write, and 20,000 families to support, since he's killed off their moms or dads.

The only 'redemption' would be if he somehow undid the bad stuff he's done, which, given the presence of the Time Trapper, and the already messed-up appearance of the timeline, seems entirely possible here. (Holo-Olsen and the LSV, in particular, seem to be telling him stuff in a very calculated and methodical way to lead him to where the Time Trapper wants him to go, which makes me suspect that they either remember things wrong, thanks to the Trapper's machinations, or, in the case of Holo-Olsen, were designed that way, to sow maximum killing rage in Prime.)

I can't see him reacting well to finding out that the Time Trapper has been pulling his strings. (I can't imagine the rest of the LSV reacting very well to such an event, either, for that matter, and some of them, like Ol-Vir, could also really put a cramp in his plans.)

I think that for Superman, the question of whether something is too good for Prime or not is not the most important one. For Superman, redeeming him must seem like the only way of making him harmless: if he wants to kill people, he's going to kill people, so the only thing left is to get him to not want to anymore.

He's pretty much proven that it's impossible to kill him or imprison him...

They put him into that Paradise Dimension and he broke out.
They put him into the Phantom Zone and he broke out.
They put him into the Speed Force and some alternate Earth and he broke out.
They imprisoned him in front of Krypton's Red Sun surrounded by an Honor Guard of GLs and he broke out.

And among his crimes:

He killed a ton of Thanagarians and Rannians leading up to IC.
He's killed Kal-L, the original Superman.
He's killed Conner Kent, Superboy.
He's killed several members of the Titans.
He killed a ton of GLs.
He killed the Superman(and his pregnant wife), Batman and Wonder Woman of Earth 15 or something with his bare hands.
He incinerated the Luthor of that Earth using the friction of that Earth's Atmosphere.
Then he dug through the core of that Earth destroying it.

He defacto kill the Anti-Monitor.
He killed a Guardian.

As far as we know he killed Monarch/Captain Atom

Now he's killed all the guards of this museum and a bunch of folks on Takron Galtos.


He even tried to kill Myxztlplk, brutally torturing the little imp in incredibly sadistic fashion(couldn't kill him though).


Super Brat indeed...


He's the largest mass murderer in the DC Universe...he's actually more sadistic and cruel than the Anti-Monitor who tended to erase Earths in an impersonal fashion. Prime does that..but he also does it personally as well, with absolutely no provocation.


The only way to redeem him is undo what he did...I don't think they'll do that though.


Call it a hunch, but I have a feeling he's going to wind up the responsibility of the Legion. It'll be their turn to act as his handlers....

hmmm... after reading this first issue though, i really had to wonder if Johns' plan is to insert Supe-Prime into the Superboy slot in the LSH. the Legion would rehabilitate him in the future.

didn't the Olsen-HoloBot say no one heard from Supe-Prime after 2008? doesn't the big S say he wants to rehabilitate him?
maybe the legion (all 3 of 'em) agree to take him on which (somehow) means they all have to merge in one new timeline that starts where the Time Trapper (i.e. Byrne and Co.) did the pocket universe extraction. just musing. it has to end somehow.

i noticed that Lana Lang as Insect Queen was missing from any of the Supes Museum stuff. however, i was pleased to see Quislet and Tyroc. would be nice to know what Supergirl this 'Lightning Saga' Legion remembers.

wow that....IS pretty bad.... i only knew about the superboy thing. hmm.

hopefully, if they do reform him and give the legion a new superboy, then after they wave good bye to superman someone will discreetly kill him. "ohhh i'm sorry, he fell into a black hole".

does kryptonite work against him? why is he so death resistant?

death DOES seem like the only option for this guy, but i think that's something johns will play with given that the people he's up again, superman and the legion, notoriously hate killing people.

i guess they could pull a zatanna/dr. light on him, and wipe his memory (they DO have a passel of telepaths and magic users).......... but all that is still less likely than him self-killing.

did anyone else think that they were suggesting that conner ISN'T dead? considering olsen's overview of that event?

I'm guessing that Superman doesn't so much mean to redeem Prime in the readers' eyes, but in his own eyes. If Prime can be made to feel better about his place in the world (or lack thereof), his threat will be neitralized.

Let's also bear in mind (amongst everyone's refusal to believe that the character can be redeemed) that the conclusion of this story might not be success in the way Superman initially sets out for. Of all the things that Prime managed to escape or survive, the Time Trapper's powers (depending on how they're depicted) are one thing that he has not yet encountered. Superman and Waverider stopped Doomsday by transporting him to the end of time (though Zero Hour later allowed Brainiac(?) to return him from there), that might be the key to neutralizing Prime.

My guess based on the powerlevels shown so far by Superboy Prime, that of the Silver Age Superman/boy...he's capable of breaking the time barrier under his own power, so the Trapper might get more than he bargained for.

Hopefully Prime will have chilled if and when he learns how to do this...it's not good to have a psychopath with that kind of power.


He's already shown the knowledge of how to jump Universes in the new 52. I can't remember if he does that under his own power or if he knows a particular spot to do it... but he has done it.

If you consider time jumping to be a form of dimensional travel...Prime has shown he can get the hang of that pretty easily too.

But nothing else stops Prime so I don't really expect the Time Trapper to be able to either...he can't even stop Superman...and Superman is not near as powerful as Prime is.

But isn't that perhaps the reason he used Prime? For that very reason that not even Superman can stop Prime. If Prime destroys Superman the Trapper could maybe even work it so he would destroy superman and accomplish what Trapper wanted?

Ya...I agree with you.

Well...Superman was the one that stopped him at the end of IC, but yeah, Prime is too much for him in a straight up fight.


Could be...you never really know how the Time Trapper stuff is going to play out. I am sure the Trapper has definite plans for Prime...but so did the Anti-Monitor. Having plans for Prime and Prime actually following them are two very different things.

True man, None of the plans for Prime really follow through.

Hell if worst came to worst, Trapper could use the one thing that Would work against Prime. Age. He aged Mccauley to dust, set rime up ner a yellow sun, quickly age it to red then age Him to a frail old man , snap his neck and then finished. That way Trapper gets a "superman" to kill.

Sorry vv, I missed your questions earlier.

In answer...no, Kryptonite doesn't do anything to him. And neither does magic.

It would take Kryptonite or magic from his Universe to harm him, and his Universe no longer exists.

Add to that the fact that he has the powers of the Pre Crisis Superman...easily the most powerful conventional Superhero ever...3 Legions are not going to be enough to take him down, they're going to need to get help.


The only thing that's slowed him down is Red Sun Radiation...and even that didn't slow him down that much, he still killed Kal-L after being put through a red sun.


I think it's very possible that Conner Kent is not dead...we'll have to wait and see though.

Some random thoughts on L3W:

- The UP Council... this isn't all the members is it? I guess it's like the UN's Security Council with some formula for partial representation.

Did the Council meeting ring remind anyone else of the Planetary Chance Machine? If there's a stalemate, I guess recalcitrant voting nations get flung off.

It's an odd set-up. Are they stuck up there? That'd be one way to insure votes actually occur. Does the whole apparatus rise? Or do the individual platforms/buggies separate and fly on their own?

- Saturn Girl and Lightning Lad... don't even seem like a couple at all. If I didn't know their history, I don't think I'd even imagine them together, the way they're portrayed. One issue in and I'm already just the tiniest bit bored with wall-to-wall classic couples.

- Saturn Queen's deadpan expression... creeped me out. Like a mannequin. Except for one panel when she's fawning (with the other LSV founders) over Prime. Is this her natural state? A result of treatment on Takron-Galtos? Evidence of her power at work? (I wonder if the whole 'You're our inspiration' bit is one big ploy?)

Could SQ be behind/contributing to Earth's misoxenoism?

I found the issue beautiful to look at and more than intriguing for a first issue.

More random thoughts.

Mordru as the Timetrapper would be too reminiscent of Kang and his Egyptian alter ego, Rama-Tut. I hope that's not the case. I agree that TT should be his own entity. Not someone else in disguise.

I'm so bored with the LSV. Can't we find someone more interesting and less over used? Fatal 5 has also been done to death. Hmm. A rogue Green Lantern corps? Super amazons of the future? DC really needs to beef up their bad guy/hostile alien races repertoire. Anybody? anybody? Buehler?

I didn't buy the "LSV hearts Superboy Prime" schtick at all. I've ranted for years that DC needs more complex villains. Nobody goes around proclaiming themselves to be "evil" or "villainous". It's trite and childish. Show me the "why". What's the motivation? Why would a whole world full of criminals slavishly devote themselves to a mass murderer from the past?

I don't know anything about Superboy Prime. Can't we use gold k on him? Maybe E Lad could whip some up.

I guess the Superboy legal battle is over, huh?

Loved the artwork overall and the basic setup so far. LOVED the Superman museum. Really hope we get one Legion at the end and not an amalgamation. Also don't want a body count extravaganza.

I hope RJ's death is real. It was powerful and well done. Undoing it would trivialize it.

If Superboy Prime really killed all the zilliions of people recorded previously on this board, then I say he's irredeemable, just as the original Jean Grey was irredeemable after destroying that planet of aliens way back when. He has to be neutralized.

Pantha had it coming. Ugh. What an awful character. It took way too long to cash in her red Star Trek uniform in my opinion.

Crisis really trashed the Legion and the Titans to no end. I hope they undo it somehow and we can all go back to the way it was before.

Where are the 3-boot Val and Luornu? Is their disappearance in the current Legion book tied in with their parallel selves' deaths in Countdown? Were they whisked into the timestream to play a part in Final Crisis?

Spelling is really a lost art on these boards.

And as we all know, "As you wish" means "I love you."

If destroying a planet that you think is filled with comic-book characters is irredeemable, is it also irredeemable to destroy a planet you just defeated in war? Nothing has changed the fact that most of the threeboot legionnaires intended to do just that, has it?

That's a story that I try to forget, APB. In fact, I hope the whole 3 boot is forgotten after this story wraps up. Give me back the "original" (or whatever the PC term is on these boards) Legion, please.

I suppose one could argue that Superboy Prime killed innocents and the Legion intended to kill a dangerous menace, but it still goes against the "thou shalt not kill" Legion code. The terror firma goons getting off scott free after destroying Orando also still sticks in my craw. Not only were they not punished, but Sun Boy went off and joined them. Just extremely poor writing in my opinion, and not the spirit of heroism that the Legion embodies at all.

But these are old debates. Let's get back to the current issue/topic . . .

After reading Legion Archives #4 and seeing Geoff Johns has used some characters from The Menace of The Mystery Legionnaire, I was wondering if he could not be using Dynamo Boy as one of the villains in L3W (maybe even as the Time Trapper). He was sent to the end of time and he does have an agenda against the Legion. Moreover, he was able to defeat the whole team, which puts him into a bigger threat that he has been portrayed since then. Maybe?

I can see where the Threeboot Legion could've gone...

The WildStorm universe. That makes sense. Or if the three Legions turn out to be three of the Multiverse's Legions.

But of course... everything and everyone around him are just factions of the dreamworld he's currently in. He's a real-life character, just like you and me. And the DC Universe isn't. Anyone still get what Earth-Prime is?

Looks as if L3W is bi-monthly now? I haven't see any official word of it, but #2 is delayed until October and no # 3 in the November announcements.

Bi-monthly for this miniseries is going to KILL me!

Finally I got it, L3W #1... and I was more than happy with it. I thought it was a riot...

The art is fantastic. After reading the book, I went through it again and again to admire the art. Perez has looked worse when the inker did not fit. Mr. Scott Koblish does fit, oh yeah! The best inker to work on Perez art since Al Vey on Avengers.

The story is great. A little bit too much of Superboy Prime for me (Superboy, they said it - are the lawsuits over?), but still great entertainment and just the right dose of classic Legion returning. I got a certain feeling of 5YL all over again - I liked Sun Boy being burnt out, Lightning Lad getting so angry at the UP, the return of Mon-El and Brande just to name a few moments.

One more thing it did: it wanted me to immediately reread Lightning Saga and the Action six-parter. I really am more than content with this first issue, and I hope that the writing stays this way and we are getting a great finale somewhen in 2009

With quality that good, it GOTTA be bimonthly! Er... not. Maybe it's just me, but with a ton of backstory issues to catch up on, I doubt I would be ready for #2 this month.

By the way, almost every other FC issue is delayed. Makes me wonder how Marvel handled their crossovers, with ten times more tie-ins.

Marvel doesn't work miracles as well. Civil War was full of delays, mainly to McNiven not being up to the challenge. Instead of bringing guest artists in, they kept McNiven, whose art I did not think to be that spectacular in the first place...

actually (as i attempted to query in a separate thread), it appears to be distributed randomly, because if you look at the solicits for October on DC's website, #2 comes out mid-October, but then #3 comes out the VERY NEXT week, but then nothing in November.

I wonder if perhaps they just somehow entered #3 in the wrong month...