This piece contains spoilers for the current series. The spoiler section is marked so you can read around it.
This new take on the Legion characters by Waid and Kitson was aimed at readers unfamiliar with the comic, which I am! The first arc has recently concluded, with issue 14 acting as both epilogue and preparation for further stories. Issue 15 is a flashback issue that answers a nagging question. From 16 onwards the title will become Supergirl and the Legion.
If you were to re-launch a series, a 14-part arc might not be the first option you think of, yet this is what Waid decided to do. It was done with a good deal of subtlety too. The first 6 issues worked as a means of introducing us to a large cast of varied characters, whilst showing us the future of the 31st century and setting up the adversary for the overall arc. The future as seen here is one of absolute security and authority in control, it appears perfect, until it’s shown that you can do very little due to that security ethos. What is expected of you is to do as you are told and trust in the authorities. Always.
The opening pages of the story show how the future came about and it’s easy to see how a movement like the Legion can arise in a society prizing order, stability and security above all. By featuring the Legion encountering an adult crackdown on a planet unaffiliated with the United Planets (UP), the Legion gets to see the benefits of the system they are opposed to. They have been endorsed rather than repressed by the UP, why? Probably because the authorities are more than aware harsh measures will not be effective, although the Police disagree with the agenda over persuasion over intimidation. Others like the Lallorians decide to replace law with brute force, showing that adults control by coercion alone. Where the UP is shown to be wrong is in choosing statistical benefits to over-ride other moral concerns, like the fact that kids have had their arms broken simply for flying the Legion’s flag. The Legion’s response is to defy the big picture for the sake of supposed smaller concerns.
The UP’s outlook is to provide both security and stability, to act in such a way as to please everyone. Or as Sun Boy’s parents put it: “We live in dull, conservative times. People would rather assimilate than innovate.” This is a literal conservatism quite different to that advocated by political parties today. The UP has used technology to track every kid in the galaxy, in the name of keeping them safe. The Legion is puncturing this ideal with the point that it can’t be done. To safeguard one group means opposing another, this in turn unravels the stability and security that the UP tries to maintain. As early as the second issue we see a pre-cognitive society acting to shut down their children’s ability so as to avoid their foreseeing a massive war - what’s more important, security or the truth? This only increases when the Legion act to allow all the Naltorian kids to see the future their elders are blocking from them in the name of protection. The elders do have a point. The Legion however frame it as truth or security, and they choose truth, yet the truth doesn’t always comfort or help. Sometimes it causes just the opposite. Perhaps that’s the point, that like the UP, the Legion is far from perfect, they may choose wrongly. We know they chose correctly and by stopping the war, the future foreseen is averted: Is it better to fear the future or embrace it? Again the Legion choose the latter.
Spoilers ahead – please skip ahead if you wish to avoid
We later find out that the impending war is being engineered as a means of forcing progress onto a static system. Equally established is the tension between Cosmic Boy (Cos), the leader of the Legion and Brainiac 5, who is convinced he should lead. One question the early and later issues skirt around is where and what the dividing line is between child and adult. Despite their claims to the latter, Cos and Brainy are quite liable to act like children at times, in their demands and expectations of those around them. In this respect they are utter teenagers. At the same time the authorities can be somewhat petty and narrow-minded. The fifth and sixth issues reveal the villain to be Praetor Lemnos, a power broker with the ability to cause people to forget seeing him, although the Legion have only seen his agents’ actions in attacking and destroying a couple of worlds.
What is the Legion to do? Does it simply represent the galaxy’s underage citizens and help avert a foreseen war or does it act to go further and enforce change? This is the Cos-Brainiac conflict in essence. The difference is one of ethos and outlook, Brainiac is arrogant enough to believe everything can be reduced down to variables and equations, that logic is the answer in all situations. Cos is not convinced, but he doesn’t have a counter.
The stakes are raised further by an attack on Colu, Brainy’s home planet, which he has deduced as a logical prime target. At the same time Cos allows his own frustration at Brainic’s arrogance to boil over and raids his lab. Although Brainy uncovers Lemnos on Colu, Lemnos manipulates Brainy’s rivalry with Cos. The following couple of issues sees the Legion rip itself apart as the Cos-Brainiac rivalry explodes, as Lemnos had hoped. Terror Firma, Lemnos’ own super-agents take advantage to hit the United Planets fuel supply. Brainiac takes over what is left of the Legion and Invisible Kid, who has become a pariah due to his supposed role in setting off the schism, sees that everything depends on 3 key worlds. As the Legion teeters on the brink of disintegration, those that took it there act to bring it back from the edge.
Issues 10 to 13 focus on the Legion uncovering Lemnos’ plan of attack and their own counter to it. They are unaware that Lemnos has a plan to take out the Legion and it involves his second-in-command, Elysion being captured. Lemnos has placed various human bombs in the Legion’s midst who explode, bringing down their HQ, killing Dream Girl and freeing Elysion to attack the UP HQ. The other primary targets are the teleportation energy world and a communications hub. Meanwhile the Legion have also sent a team to Terror Firma’s home planet to investigate and they find a huge army on the march. The multiple conflicts rage and conclude in a quite satisfying conclusion, as each team is successful in its goal and all that remains is Terror Firma’s elite, who turn on Lemnos as he shows his true colours. Terror Firma turn out to be the descendants of exiled criminals innocent of any crime themselves, and Lemnos hooked them with revolutionary rhetoric. Sun Boy decides to leave the Legion to lead them, whether he can redeem them is an open question. Meanwhile Brainiac has effectively kidnapped and imprisoned Lemnos in his lab and orders him to save Dream Girl…
End of spoilers
It can be asked why 14 issues are needed to tell the story? If the intent was simply to tell the story, then the issue count could be greatly reduced. The plot is not the key item. Other equally important aims are establishing the characters and the world. For the story to work we need to see how the future operates, how it succeeds and fails. Only when we have that does the conflict between Lemnos and the Legion work, because whilst both may share similar goals, their methods could not be more opposed. Though unhappy with the status quo, the Legion doesn’t want to rip it to pieces. Indeed one of the keys to their victory is the use of the Public Service, a technology that watches over all kids not equipped with Legion flight rings which hide the Legion from its gaze. The other reason for the length of the arc is that it takes time to introduce a cast of 14 heroes, with other characters on top of that. Still, a 14-issue arc isn’t for everyone and the series deserves to be a success in collected form.
There were also a couple of innovations in the format that worked very well. The first was that some issues had a short back-up story focused on one character. These individual character pieces prove to be very effective. The second is the all too infrequent, but always inspired letters page, where the Legion is shown answering letters from readers. Consequently the 30-page format worked well as it allowed the room for either feature to turn up in an issue. Other smart design points is an introduction panel showing the primary characters for the particular issue, by issue 12 it’s decidedly full but in early issues it is a changing line-up, depending on who is in the story or not.
Issue 14 is an epilogue tale that sees the Legion being offered recognition by the UP, with legitimacy equal to the Police. All of a sudden the Legion have gone from despised revolutionaries to lauded innovators. It’s one thing to campaign for reform and change, what happens when you not only get noticed but recognised and invited in? Lemnos used the rhetoric of fighting against the system to recruit Terror Firma and the Legion has done similar, so can you work within the system to change it? It will be interesting to see if Waid really does something different here, as there is no shortage of fight-the-system and corrupted-by-the-system stories. Yet society changes because it wants to change, sometimes due to people working in the system. The Legion may no longer have rebel cool but they might actually be able to put their ideas into play instead of talking about them and protesting their lack of power. In effect the UP have said to the Legion: Fine, you’ve shown us we’re not perfect, you want to have power and effect change to improve things? Here you are, you in?
Issue 15 as the last one before the title change and the arrival of Supergirl is an odd issue. It seems to be set back before the final battles of the arc and sees a number of dispirited Legionnaires tell stories of the Legion’s past exploits. Fans of previous incarnations may recognise these stories, or the stories are an excuse to engage in retro-style art, I’m not sure which it is. There’s also a mention of the word ‘crisis’ so it looks like Supergirl’s insertion might be linked to Infinite Crisis. I’m somewhat ambivalent about that. It would have been good to have one title independent of Infinite Crisis, especially given that Legion is 1000 years on. On the other hand I can see the creative team doing something unexpected and making it work.
The series refuses to make things utterly clear-cut, thus both the UP and the Legion have their blind spots. The UP is unwilling to acknowledge the prospect of violent invasion by those not interested in negotiation, which is what they rely upon. The Legion for their part have a tendency to let their rhetoric get out of control, such as championing lost causes without caution, which nearly sees an entire society of kids get killed by Terror Firma. The Legion should have added that logic can override idealism and that battles need to be picked. It was also the lack of restraint and superpowers that made the internal schism in the Legion so destructive. In a final demonstration of this attitude, Terror Firma are effectively kids angry at being punished for their parents misdeeds and their keen sense of injustice due to the UP was expertly manipulated by Lemnos. Should they be wholly responsible for what they did? The Legion says yes, the UP will probably be more lenient on the basis they are not adults. Here the Legion’s stance that underage citizens have as much to contribute as adults clashes with the legal division of child and adult that the UP likely use.
All in all, I’d judge the re-launch to be a success. It may have seemed ambitious to start with a big arc, but when done well, as was the case here, and also in Captain America, it can pay off spectacularly. At times the title may have seemed a little slow when read on a month-by-month basis, but each piece fits into a larger whole neatly. Kitson’s art is always great to see, even if it isn’t always present and the other artists are as good. There is a consistent feel and design to the art on the book. For his part Waid seems to excel on long arcs, as seen by Birthright and JLA: Year One. I came to this title never having read anything with these characters, my interest as a result of my liking the creative team’s previous collaborations. I’m now quite hooked and eager to see where things go in this futuristic corner of the DC universe.
Issues 1-13 are collected in the TPBs: Legion of Superheroes: Vol. 1:Teenage Revolution and the forthcoming Legion Of Superheroes: Vol. 2: Death Of A Dream
Ben Crofts is resident in Essex, works in London and has found comics and philosophy mix surprisingly well.