Legion World Forums LEGION CLUBHOUSE The Legion of Super-Heroes Re-Reading the Legion: Archives #1

The plan: Every weekday we re-read a Legion issue, starting from the first Legion story in 1958 and going as far as we can to the present day. See this thread for more details.

My kids love the Archives and we read them together all the time, but truth be told, we usually skip #247 most times. For all it's importance and the fact that it introduced a fun new concept that we all love, it's not a "great" story, and it's reprinted and reread so much, it's kind of something that gets the obligatory nod and then we move on.

So, I open my archives and the first thing I see:

"The Origins and Powers of the Legion of Super-Heroes!"

A later variant of this feature can be found here.

"In the city of Metropolis, in the 21st century, there exists one of the most amazing clubs of all time! Its members are teen-aged youths, each possessing one special super-power! The club members have vowed to use their fantastic powers to battle crime. Years ago, when Superman was Superboy, he joined the club when its members contacted him during a visit into the past... this rocket-shped building is the super-hero clubhouse!"

PHANTOM GIRL: We see her popping up unexpectedly in the middle of a Legion meeting. Sun Boy and Cosmic Boy looks startled, Bouncing Boy looks bemused, and Vi has the same worried look she always does!

TRIPLICATE GIRL: Poor dude should've brought more flowers!

BRAINIAC FIVE: I love him standing there laughing at the villains who are trying to shoot him! It really evokes the original Brainiac story, in which Brainiac does an awful lot of laughing at Punyman who can't break through his force shield!

LIGHTNING LAD: I'm not sure that blasting a falling girder with electricty is really all that useful, but whatevs.

BOUNCING BOY: I like to think that he bounces down and snatches the paper he's carrying from the crooks.

INVISIBLE KID: Spying on crooks, as usual!

SHRINKING VIOLET: Wonder why she's sneaking under that old school wooden door?

COSMIC BOY: Only Cosmic Boy can prevent traffic accidents!

CHAMELEON BOY: The famous rubbish can scene!

SATURN GIRL: She never commands monsters/animals anymore.

COLOSSAL BOY: That water seems kind of shallow for that boat. Maybe that's why he's picking it up, because they need to be rescued?

SUN BOY: Melting rockets like he melts hearts!


Coming later today: My thoughts on Adventure #247!

The first review! Lets do this!

First, for those of you using your Archives (as opposed to those using their duplicate, crappier copy of Adventure #247, like I suspect Pov secretly has been hoarding): in the extra sequence showing all the Legionnaires showing off their powers, note the first appearance of Cobalt Kid in LSH continuity as I hand Luornu a bouquet of flowers. Triplets in short skirts and boots always was my style as a beardless youth. (Reach for the stars and all that...)

Next: I firmly believe the solution to all the Legion's problems would include Superman when he was a boy being part of the team, having his own series called "Superboy" and being light-hearted.

While Cos and Garth are both good looking red-blooded, all-Ameri--er, youths, they aren't overly handsome like Tenzil, Dirk and Jo. Meanwhile, Imra is stunning from his first park bench appearance. She really also is a star from the get-go. I can't wait for when she gets pushy and puts the Legionnaires in their place!

When you're Superboy, you tend to accept explanations like time travelers coming back to recruit you without much suspicion.

"What an honor...*choke*" - gosh, that Superboy is a good kid

I demand to know the story behind the Statue of the Unknown Spaceman and how it sank to the bottom of the ocean!!! Theory #1: its J'onn J'onzz and he lives in it like Jacob from lost!

I hate invisible eagles! I could swear there's a nest of them in my backyard!

Y'know these Legion kids sure are a bunch of jerks! I wonder what century saw hazing become popular again?

I'm sure glad that colorist turned "lame ol' 31st Century Potzie" into Brainiac 5!

I wonder who else has been rewarded the Superhero #1 Award? Surely others must have proven worthy enough!

What can be said about the first appearance? It's already long been a "classic". I actually think the Legionnaires themselves don't come across very great, but the 31st century (or more accurately: the future) and the concept of them is just genius. And of course, its a solid Superboy story.

Just you wait, Cobie... I have long felt that - just below the surface of the Legion's history - is a deep rooted conspiracy to hide what, if known, would represent perhaps the greatest crime ever committed in the DC Universe (but one which, in the final analysis, was absolutely necessary). As we go through these reviews, I will cite the damning evidence and let you draw your own conclusions.


Clue Number 1 is... The Statue of the Unknown Spaceman of Venus.

As is evidenced in this scene, retcons are nothing new to LSH history:

Hm. Cos looks a little hungover in this panel. Perhaps the "tomorrow we go get Superboy to join!" party was a little too rowdy? Is that sexual tension between Cos and Imra? Or awkwardness after a night she'd like to never remember, and Cos--well--cannot!

OK, so, thoughts:

The Cover - Absolutely iconic to any Legion fan - heck, probably any fan of comics in general. A couple quick observations: Number one, every time I see this cover, I always laugh a little at the motion lines around Superboy's head. You generally only see things like that on covers to indicate dramatic motion (like speed or flight). The inclusion here always makes me think that Superboy's head turn was a particularly dramatic fashion, accompanied with a "Moe Sizlack"-like "Whaaaaaaa?"

Secondly, very small thing, but - although all their lights have gone to "No", it looks to me like only Cos and Garth are still depressing their buttons. Saturn Girl's finger looks as though the pressure has already been released - ergo, Imra rejected him first. Right on, Iron-butt!

Cos's helmet. Man... I really wish I knew when the story or the cover was drawn first (If I recall, both were common practice). At no point in the story does Cos actually wear the helmet, and - as I'll talk about later, if the story came first, I'll bet this is actually a mistake on Curt Swan's part.


Page 1 - Yummy Al Plastino art. I sort of dig Imra as slightly strawberry blonde. Thunderclap lightning, magnetic eyes... I wonder if these power uses were inspired by these common phrases?


Page 2 - Yup, Clark...just ignore it and maybe it'll go away.

OK... here's what I'm saying about Cos's "helmet". Look at it in that last panel. Not only is there a non-transparent base, but - to the left - there is also a "glint" that is shaped like a rectangular opening. I don't think it's a helmet at all but rather....


Page 3 - ... the Time Bubble. In panel two, and onward, we keep seeing the door of the bubble looking exactly like the "glint" of Cos's "helmet" on the previous page. I suspect that, as drawn, Al Plastino intended that the Bubble could shrink to "carrying size" then grow to full size. I think Swan must have seen Cos carrying it and accidentally interpreted it as a helmet for the cover. I asked Al Plastino about this once at a convention, but he couldn't remember which came first.


Page 4 - "Nine Planets" - heh, you go, Pluto! So... if the robot hadn't gone dead, molten steel would have been dripping in the classroom? That can't be good. Just a side note: That teacher totally looks like Perry White.


Page 5 - Spoke too soon, yep... dripping steel. Ah... Unknown Spaceman... see my previous post.


Page 6 - A million dollar robot? A nuclear ray? That school has some major grants.


Page 7 - Again... the Unknown Spaceman. How exactly is he "unknown" and yet his works are not? Who is he... where did he come from? I've got some ideas...


Page 8 - "Project Vanguard"... wow, that is a topical freaking reference for when this comic was published. I think it's generally accepted that Adventure 247 hit the stands sometime in February of 1958. The first satellite put into orbit by Project Vanguard wasn't launched until Jan 31st, 1958:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Vanguard

Either lead time on stories used to be far shorter, or this was a speculative reference in advance of the launch's success.


Page 9 - Damn, that eagle means business... look at the size of the hole!


Page 10 - "A million miles in space"? No, no... "A million miles... of SPACE!" "A million space-miles" is also acceptable.


Page 11 - Weepy Clark. How about you just... I don't know... don't tell them. It's 1000 years in the future... who's going to find out your shame?

Robots are subject to telepathy? OK... I'll go with it.

Ah-ha! The eagle was innocent. I judged you too soon, Invisible Eagle.


Page 12 - Pa Kent, just rolling with the punches.


Conclusion... I agree with Cobie, fantastic example of a Superboy story, but somewhat surprising to me that it made enough of an impact to be reprised later into a recurrent feature. I'd be curious about the contemporary fan-reaction. Does anyone know what issue the respective letters page about this story ran in... or if they are posted somewhere online?

^^See Mike Gold's introduction to the Archive for some discussion of contemporary fan reaction.

Today's Facebook post:

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?...7.135411229814243&type=1&theater

Yeeesh, I want to participate heavily with links to other threads (Only Cosmic Boy can prevent forest fires) and more pictures but I keep getting "Internet Explorer Cannot Display the Webpage" errors. I'll check back later or tomorrow.

So... fun things about this issue:

1) Secret identity concerns: nothing says Silver Age Superboy like worries over an outsider learning his secret identity!

2) Robots: nothing says retrofuturism likes lots of robots! In our first glimpse of the Legion's time, there's a robot picking up litter! Then there's the robot factory next to the preserved site of the Kent house (it occurs to me they didn't leave much room for this historical monument as well). And, of course, the malfunctioning Superboy robot is a major plot element.

3) Crazy future wildlife: Both the Neptunian invisible eagle and the strange denizen of the deep that obey's Imra's commands are pretty cool!

4) The Jules Verne: It's kind of groovy that they insert a reference to this sci fi pioneer in the form of an "around the world in 80 minutes" tour ship named after him. I wonder if it's supposed to be the same as the "round-the-world" rocket liner that crashes later on in the issue?

5) Man, Superboy cries so much you'd think he was a Marv Wolfman character!

6) The Nine Planets, Nova Express, Statue of the Unknown Spaceman, South Pole City... all groovy stuff!

You know, I just took it for granted that the Jules Verne that crashes later! And I agree--love the reference.

I wonder if the invisible eagle comes from a Terran eagle mating with an invisible alien bird? I bet Animal Lad knows.

I'd bet that there actually was no invisible eagle, but it was actually Beast Boy on a scout mission for the Lallorians.
Do we ever see (well hear of) an invisible eagle after this issue?
No? Something else else as exotic as an invisible eagle never spoken of again....I smell a conspiracy.

Or that shamless hussy was projecting crazy thoughts into Superboys mind

You should edit some of this, especially the Time Bubble/helmet and Project Vanguard, into the Legion Wiki!
http://www.legionwiki.com/wiki/index.php?title=Adventure_Comics_247

I thought that at first, but then I noticed the shadowy rocket shown crashing looks nothing like the giant yellow ball that the space tourists are entering.

By the way, I took a brief look at the synopses of the issues surrounding this one for the year previous and the year afterward, and this one certainly seems to stand out from the crowd, so I can see why it was a fan fave. Most of the rest of them are fairly conventional Superboy fare (random thing/person from Krypton shows up on Earth, random person gets Superboy like powers, someone is trying to guess Superboy's secret identity, etc.). Interestingly, the other one that stands out as a bit of an oddball is the Lorac-K7 story, which also features a visit from 1,000 years in the future!

Given that the one future major reference to Neptune in the Legion is as Ron-Karr's homeworld, the "invisible eagle" may not be invisible at all, but just really hard to see from certain angles when it becomes flat!

Can do!


Another observation, after doing a little color comparison between the story as originally printed, and then later reprinted:

People often cite the recoloring of the background Legionnaire as Brainiac 5 in later reprinting... but there's actually another bit of iconic coloring which - as originally seen - was a little bit less than iconic. Check it out:



Orange, eh? I'm really glad someone punched up that color scheme in a later story.

YES!!!

You've done it! This MUST be canon! Graet detective work, Ester! Already we've cracked the long open case of the Invisible Eagle!

OK I must comment on this first:



Phantom Girl looks a bit *Invisible*!

and ... I thought Lightning Lad must've been more powerful in the past ...he blasted the crap out of those girders!

Imra needs to control animals and robots more often! She's gotten lazy ... mindwiping only humans!!!!

Shrinking Violet must be on a mission in the past ... or at a museum for doors. AN UNTOLD STORY!

My first thoughts:

Damn that Legion of Super Heroes is a bunch of b*tches!!!

They made Ordinary Boy CRY!

I loved the Magnetic eyes and thought beams! and clapping to produce lightning while not so practical was fun. Garth should have had a costume with a line down his middle emphasizing his positive and negative charges.

Those wacky back packs have straps on the back but not the front ... must be some crazy future backpack straps that don't need to wrap all the way around ... and they must be puffing out helium or something so our Legionnaires don't get their buns burned off.


No wonder Imra was in such a bad mood all the time ... THE SEXIST PIGS! "even a girl!" "beat by a girl!"

but you don't see her crying, do you Ordinary Boy ... and if they rejected her ... she wouldn't act like it was a ok ...


That helmet is totally the Time Bubble.

I like the original costume colors ! and look, no underpants on top!!! New 52 is not soooo new. I also like how Ordinary Boy's X-Ray vision is the heat vision ... but ... those kids in the auditorium should really get checked for cancer. I mean the amount of X-Rays needed to melt steel ... must be a lot.


How much property damage occurred while the LSH were hazing Ordinary Boy ??

Waid, this is the real problem with a sanitized and utopian future ... these super heroes have an idle rich complex ... they're so bored they just blow shit up and think of ways to humiliate super heroes from the past!

I hope they made a young Wonder Woman cry. Imra probably punched her in the face. hahahahahaha!

I sure hope that the lost Nova Express was looking for those ten seconds Lightning Lad' sign was visible to them out in space. oh well. Back to hazing Ordinary Boy!

Can't wait for tomorrow when they make Ordinary Boy cry again. Nice friends you got there Ordinary Boy.

Seriously. They could've shown up in a white van.

Now, I am beginning to doubt that Lightning Boy is even Lightning Lad. Lightning Boy's hair is more red.

Imra and Cos switched him with someone off panel who would not fry them at every ceremony where he clapped. With Imra's penchant for mind wiping ... how many Lightning Lad's have there been ?

Lightning Boy is probably sitting in the 9 Planet's Pub where he recounts his glory days with the Legion of Super Heroes.

It's actually Mekt!