it's fascinating that the reason for the mask wasn't addressed sooner. In virtually any other super-team, having members with masks is normal, but in this era of the LSH Ferro Lad was the ONLY one to do so! Interesting, skimming thru the 2-parter that introduces him and the rest of the "Shooter Four", that Ferro Lad isn't even mentioned as a suspect for being the traitor. The mask and its relative unusualness would have been a natural cause for suspicion in a situation that would naturally make everyone paranoid. (Projectra's illusion-casting could have aroused suspicion as well.)
Honestly, reading Ferro Lad's few original appearances is very interesting. The character has such a mystique about him, it's hard not to look for clues as to his inner character in every word he says and everything he does. Cobie has always described him as basically a fearless daredevil, so I watch every panel with him in it with that description in mind. So far it fits, but he's also just as chatty as the other characters and kind of engaging in his own way. I've always thought of him as being extra solitary, kind of a "lone wolf" more so than Brin because of his disfigurement. His appearances are challenging that preconception in a real way.
So with one "live" appearance to go, we'll see what kind of impression his character leaves (other than, you know, the obvious!).....
Otherwise, we have a guy with an axe, a guy with a hand and a guy. Lots of writers have come up with bad guys like these that didn't stick.
I disagree. I think, of these three, that Tharok has a pretty iconic look and hook about him. I'm not sure, but he may have been the one among them who most captured my tween imagination. Swan really nails the creepy aspect of his look. The robot half is imperfectly integrated with the human half--meaning the proportion is not evened out to account for flesh and sinew. The facial "bumps" and two-toed foot enhance the alien-ness of that side. But when you add in how his human eye is black with a white pupil, he just exudes evil. I'd say, even after all these years, that Tharok's potential has just barely had its surface scratched!
Mano also has a very original, interesting visual. And with his ability to destroy a whole planet, he's potentially the most dangerous of the five. Tons of potential, also, that's barely been explored.
Persuader...yeah, pretty much the weakest link in terms of his needing the other four to validate his existence. His axe, however, has often had its abilities explored in creative ways. Shooter sets kind of a goofy standard for it with the gravity-cancelling example shown in this story. Definitely rolled my eyes at that one! What needed to be done with him was to make his character complex and interesting to counteract his more "blah" look and power-set. Never really happened.
Re Tharok, I'd say he's dangerous because of his treachery and intelligence. he may not have the raw power of the Emerald Empress, but the way he took control of the rest of the five. Perhaps now we don't consider his visual to be scary because cyborgs in comics have become a dime-a-dozen, but I think for the time this was originally published Tharok presented avery scary figure indeed.
I agree with you that Mano and Persuader don't look quite as imposing, but as I noted earlier in this thread Shooter did a good job of demonstrating how tough they are in a fight.
I first encountered the character of Feero/Ferro Lad in the SW6 era. Looking back, I'm surprised myself as to how strong a foundation the Adventure Era had laid for his future characterization! Honestly, it's a shame that the Postboot version of Ferro didn't adopt the same personality.
My thoughts on the two-parter as a whole were given on the last review but I'd add that while #352 does a wonderful job being the set-up issue, #353 does a great job being the follow-through. We get plenty of drama and tension as the duel menaces of the Fatal Five and Sun-Eater cause our heroes all manner of stress. And the ending...what more can be said? (I'll try anyway...)
The issue starts by giving us what we really want after #352: namely, the 5 Legionnaires and the 5 villains interacting together. There's enough going on there to create a 10 issue miniseries! Mano and the Emerald Empress especially get some screen time which highlights how cutthroat they are.
From there, it's time to get to the mission at hand! Tharok's plan is simple yet effective for the reader; it builds the tension even more.
Each of the 10 plays their part, and while Sun Boy and the Persuader do their job, it's too powerful for the others to stop. The artwork here by Swan is particularly engrossing--perhaps his best Legion effort yet! There is a sense of scale and epic-ness that screams out from the page.
I've also always liked the bit between Validus and Projectra that I wish was followed up on later in Legion history.
Throughout the 2 parter, Ferro Lad has been portrayed as a daredevil full of courage. T&M were right to play this up with the Legionnaires series.
The core of the Sun Eater looks a bit like the Master of the Thieves Planet! I feel there *must* be an EDE theory to follow this!
And from there...we get perhaps the most memorable death of them all. Ferro Lad, in a series of panels that are now the stuff of legend, makes the ultimate sacrifice. The panel where the Legion witnesses it and reacts is incredibly well done. It's silent Sun Boy, who only looks on in shock as depicted by Swan, that really makes it hit home.
But things aren't over yet! The Fatal Five turn on the Legion as Tharok slaps Cos (causing us to have one of the all time great LW Legion threads circa 2005 joking about they panel and its later ramifications) and Sarya breaks out the Green K handcuffs. But Jeckie convinces Validus to save them and the Fatal 5 turn on each other! But...they disappear, and the Legion barely gets out of this one alive! There *must* be a follow up, and I bet reader demand was insane for more Fatal 5 after this.
From there, it's time to mourn the lost Legionnaire. A final send off, echoing the earlier memorial to Triplicate Girl ensures that all future dead Legionnaires will share a similar tribute. It's a moody, tragic end and suddenly the series is more heavy and dramatic then ever before.
What an amazing story. I've read it probably more than any other Legion story and it still holds up. This story matured not only the franchise, but I suspect many of the fans.
Bonus Lettercol Review: reader Dave Olsen responds to a prior letter written by Elizabeth Kane, disagreeing about romance in the Legion. This kicks off a full blown argument in the Legion Lettercols for the next year to come! For anyone who has a chance to check them out, do so! It's the first Legion fandom flame war! And it gets intense!
Liz Kane was hugely prolific in the letter columns. She has 2 (!) letters printed in this one.
And the really bombshell: Nelson reveals Imra and Garth are engaged!!! I wonder if ifs ever mentioned again before the wedding?
I really liked the panels where each of the Legionnaires/Five takes on the Sun-Eater. They all put up a valiant effort, and Shooter does a good job of making each JUST effective enough to make us think - hey, maybe this one time will do it!
Poor Validus, not really evil yet dominated by Tharok.. I wonder if he (at the time) was smart enough to realize what wa shappening. It's especially sad knowing who Validus really was...
Alas, Ferro Lad gets blown up. Given previous stories, his body WOULD have had to be totally damaged so the Legion wouldn't go through a "Resurrect Lightning Lad" story. You just know they would have, even though he'd been a member for such a short time.
Otherwise, we have a guy with an axe, a guy with a hand and a guy. Lots of writers have come up with bad guys like these that didn't stick.
I disagree. I think, of these three, that Tharok has a pretty iconic look and hook about him. I'm not sure, but he may have been the one among them who most captured my tween imagination. Swan really nails the creepy aspect of his look. The robot half is imperfectly integrated with the human half--meaning the proportion is not evened out to account for flesh and sinew. The facial "bumps" and two-toed foot enhance the alien-ness of that side. But when you add in how his human eye is black with a white pupil, he just exudes evil. I'd say, even after all these years, that Tharok's potential has just barely had its surface scratched!
Mano also has a very original, interesting visual. And with his ability to destroy a whole planet, he's potentially the most dangerous of the five. Tons of potential, also, that's barely been explored.
Persuader...yeah, pretty much the weakest link in terms of his needing the other four to validate his existence. His axe, however, has often had its abilities explored in creative ways. Shooter sets kind of a goofy standard for it with the gravity-cancelling example shown in this story. Definitely rolled my eyes at that one! What needed to be done with him was to make his character complex and interesting to counteract his more "blah" look and power-set. Never really happened.
Re Tharok, I'd say he's dangerous because of his treachery and intelligence. he may not have the raw power of the Emerald Empress, but the way he took control of the rest of the five. Perhaps now we don't consider his visual to be scary because cyborgs in comics have become a dime-a-dozen, but I think for the time this was originally published Tharok presented avery scary figure indeed.
To me, it's not that cyborgs in comics are a dime a dozen, but that Tharok's two halves being evenly split looks kinda, well...goofy. Just my opinion.
That's why I said earlier in this thread he needs a state-of-the-art re-design.
Tharok slaps Cos (causing us to have one of the all time great LW Legion threads circa 2005 joking about they panel and its later ramifications)
I think Cosmic Boy deserves any kind of abuse he receives.
Originally Posted by Cobalt Kid
Bonus Lettercol Review: reader Dave Olsen responds to a prior letter written by Elizabeth Kane, disagreeing about romance in the Legion. This kicks off a full blown argument in the Legion Lettercols for the next year to come! For anyone who has a chance to check them out, do so! It's the first Legion fandom flame war! And it gets intense!
Liz Kane was hugely prolific in the letter columns. She has 2 (!) letters printed in this one.
I'm deeply jealous that you have access to the original issues with the lettercolumns. But I still love you.
And to something Lardy was saying on previous page, I'm also heavily watching every panel Ferro Lad is in to discern even the slightest character trait. Like you, I'm delighted at how social and affable he is--not a loner at all.
And on Tharok--did you see how ugly and boring he was *before* the cybernetics?
Well, here's a thought: Did destroying the Sun-Eater violate the Legion Code against killing? I mean, Ferro Lad refers to the core as its "life force" and there are other references to same, so....?
Good point. It reveals some interesting grey areas. Like what is one life when billions of other lives are at stake? I don't think they had any choice in the matter -- the Sun-Eater was a threat of such magnitude that niceties like the code against killing went out the window. It would have been interesting if that had been explored further, but the Silver Age aesthetic would not have accomodated those explorations.
The death was heroic and amazingly, not foolish. It was well set up with FL's "unsuccessful" battle with his portion of the divided Sun Eater. Much in the depiction of and after his death was a huge
thud.
From the bottom two panels of p.19 to ALL p. 20, the dialogue and narration are a complete disaster IMO. The art is great until the so important bottom two panels of p. 20.
Can you imagine the emotional release? After a long, hopeless fight, a universe was saved. A friend lost. And with their bland faces they say the words expected but with no conviction shown in the art. Like the politician that has the obligation to express sorrow but really doesn't give a crap one way or the other.
Oh by the way, you outlaws will receive you pardon. SERIOUSLY! THIS is what is on your mind?
It is even sadder a missed opportunity in light of wonderfully done depictions of emotion in recent issues. That these two panels should so fail to show the magnitude of what has just happened....
sigh.
This is just blah.
From the bottom of p19 to the last two panels of p20, I think it's pretty clear from the panel images, what is happening. IMO, removing the narration better depicts the death in the silence of space. As is, the narration steals the thunder from the character of Ferro Lad.
In depicting the Legionnaires' reactions, I was SO disappointed that they used narration, "death weighed heavily..." instead of Swan's usually terrific art.
The art also never showed the Fatal Five taking advantage of the moment to gain an upper-hand.
"all in fetters" Seriously?
The story picks back up when Tharok commands Validus. In this instance, I think the narration did a great job of slowing down the scene, adding apprehension. Dialogue then falls apart again as Superboy makes the supposition ( a desperate and unneeded attempt to set up a future storyline I'm convinced), "it could have burst a dimensional barrier." Really? It could have sent them to Disney land. "I bet we haven't heard the last..."
Reader: Hey! I bet we're going to see a future story in which the Fatal Five is trapped in another dimension!
No duh!
Not needed and distracting from the emotion of the real story. A Legionnaire has died an heroic death. THAT's the story.
Then following, we seem to have Brainiac 5 attempting to preempt some anal readers, "well why didn't Brainy just dues ex machina" to get Ferro's remains..."
Great story idea but written without confidence. I continually felt dialogue and narration were written to preempt criticism and deny the art the ability to tell the story.
I concur that the story could have used a little more craft, particularly around the parts Beebs describes. Young Shooter didn't know much about building up to and capitalizing on the big moment he'd written. And maybe that can be a valid criticism of this issue.
Even beyond the minimalist approach, it makes sense given Ferro Lad's brief time with the team. Most likely, he had little time to develop really deep bonds with his fellow Legionnaires. Though he was clearly cordial, FL probably also had some barriers built up around him because of his wearing the mask and his reasons for doing so. So the lack of a massive outpouring of grief made a lot of sense. You can, however, infer some shock in the way the Legionnaires acted, or more exactly, underreacted. That response makes a lot of sense. Shock or numbness is often the first reaction to the sudden death of another, even sometimes when it's someone close to you.
I can see what Shooter was doing, even if some of the above comments infer too deeply into his intent--he had a story to tell. And after dispensing of the Sun-Eater, he had the fatal Five situation to resolve. Plotwise, they did their part to defeat the larger threat, but then Shooter had to resolve the Five's threat as well. So he did that in a matter he deemed satisfactory and left the issue to end with a quick funeral scene. Plus, he included enough exposition to leave no doubt in the readers' mind that this death would be more permanent than Lightning Lad's had been.
I like the story just as it was. Maybe Shooter and Swan could have made some better decisions with their execution, but I wouldn't want to see them redressed. It's a classic, pure and simple.
To me, it's not that cyborgs in comics are a dime a dozen, but that Tharok's two halves being evenly split looks kinda, well...goofy. Just my opinion.
That's why I said earlier in this thread he needs a state-of-the-art re-design.
You're right, it does look goofy... thing is, what do you do for a redesign that really stands out? The most likely thing you'd end up with for a "state-of-the-art" cyborg Tharok is... well, a white version of Gear. Normal human shell with all the technology hidden away underneath.
The alternative is you go over the top with the mechanical half (as the "Fatal Four+1" and Legion Worlds stories did in the postboot, even giving him a claw in place of a mechanical hand for some reason...), but that's more steampunk than state-of-the-art.
My views are my own and do not reflect those of everyone else... and I wouldn't have it any other way.
I don't think over the top would work with Tharok. It also wouldn't fit what I feel his personality is like - he craves power and would appreciate some powerful mechanical upgrades, but he'd prefer them to be sleek and functional rather than eye-popping.
Originally Posted by Fanfic Lady
Good point. It reveals some interesting grey areas. Like what is one life when billions of other lives are at stake? I don't think they had any choice in the matter -- the Sun-Eater was a threat of such magnitude that niceties like the code against killing went out the window. It would have been interesting if that had been explored further, but the Silver Age aesthetic would not have accomodated those explorations.
The Legion toon eliminated that gray area by specifying that the Sun-Eater was some sort of machine. Makes sense, because of the audience. Though I suppose the Legion could argue that blowing up the Sun-Eater was a form of self-defense (though I'm half-expecting Brainy to prove they could have stopped it in another way, just like what he did with Star Boy! Serves Cos and Dirk right for voting against Thom!)
I was wondering about killing the Suneater, too - although it seemed more like a black hole, they did refer to it as a creature or monster with a life force. Not that the Legion couldn't justify killing such a threat to existence, but that the editor wouldn't have had the Suneater presented as a force of nature rather than a living being.
So much to love in this story, especially the way the Five squabbled and backstabbed. Untrustworthy to the end!
Did Tharok take away Validus' ability to speak, or did later writers just ignore it? I don't recall. He's scarier if he can't talk.
It's decades away, but a recent Fables story had the witches using magic to try and gather all the glass pieces and dust that was Bigby Wolf (who had been turned to glass and shattered). Perhaps today a writer would dream up something - magic or machine - to collect all of Ferro Lad.
That old letter column sure brings back memories. The letters were often as interesting as the stories.
That old letter column sure brings back memories. The letters were often as interesting as the stories.
I have them all scanned and posted them on Legion World's facebook page a while back. If you guys want, I can post them all here as we discuss each issue. Wish I'd thought to start that sooner.
Oh, that sounds wonderful! You could also link to the Facebook page so you won't have to post the letters for issues we've already finished discussing.
I don't think Validus could originally fly could he? Later he was able to fly thru space on his own.
Seems to be a common thing among Legion enemies. The writer/artist gets so used to the entire team flying through space and talking with each other while doing so (thanks to Flight Rings, transsuits and / or telepathic ear-plugs), that we end up seeing Legion foes with none of that doing the same thing. (Saturn Queen, most recently.)
To me, it's not that cyborgs in comics are a dime a dozen, but that Tharok's two halves being evenly split looks kinda, well...goofy. Just my opinion.
That's why I said earlier in this thread he needs a state-of-the-art re-design.
You're right, it does look goofy... thing is, what do you do for a redesign that really stands out? The most likely thing you'd end up with for a "state-of-the-art" cyborg Tharok is... well, a white version of Gear. Normal human shell with all the technology hidden away underneath.
The alternative is you go over the top with the mechanical half (as the "Fatal Four+1" and Legion Worlds stories did in the postboot, even giving him a claw in place of a mechanical hand for some reason...), but that's more steampunk than state-of-the-art.
Rather a white version of Gear than a guy with one nutsicle. I don't even want to know what happeded to the rest of the package.
I agree, redesign.
I did like Mano's do-over in the reboot ( I think it's the reboot. I get them confused).
Going back to whether destroying the Sun-Eater violated the Legion Code---It's not so much that I disagreed with the decision because I think there was no other choice given the timeframe. But it seems odd that the Code wasn't even discussed in-story regarding this when we'd become accustomed to that particular staple coming up over and over again in recent stories--most notably with Kenz Nuhor, but also in other situations involving non-sentient animals as in the Beast Boy story.
So the foundation was laid, with it being designated as having a "life force", for this to at least be mentioned. This doesn't ruin the story or downgrade it much if any, but it does potentially violate the Legion Code, unless some amendments regarding sentience were made in the interim.
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