Bits of Legionnaire Business

[Yeechang Lee]

Random thoughts that spring to mind as I once again reread my complete
_Legion Archives_ collection:

* Has anyone ever connected Cosmic Boy becoming the Time Trapper with
the Hag (AKA Mysa Nal)'s painting in _Adventure_ #351 prophesying
his future fate, which Miss Terious (AKA Dream Girl) prevented Rokk
from seeing as it was "too dreadful"? The _Zero Hour_-related final
pre-reboot storyline I don't believe referred to this, which in
retrospect is somewhat surprising given its numerous references to
Legion history great and small. (Note, also, that while we do see
the paintings for Ferro Lad (accurately predicting his pending death
via the Sun-Eater) and Miss Terious, but beyond Cosmic Boy's
painting we also don't see Matter-Eater Lad's. I would hope it's not
"He becomes fat" or "He gets drafted into politics.")

* Best Legion retcons:

* Validus as Saturn Girl and Lightning Lad's child. Credit here, of
course, goes to both Levitz and to the letter writer who suggested
early on that the two Legionnaires' progeny would have mental
lightning.
* v3 #300's loving tribute to the Adult Legion stories that
elegantly established them as an alternate future.
* Laurel Gand substituting for Supergirl, and the broader notion
that a full-time Laurel performed a part-time Superboy and a very
part-time Supergirl's mighty feats in Legion history. I'd give
good money for a retelling of _Adventure_ #326's "The Revolt of
the Girl Legionnaires," by the way. Laurel needs to be shown
dancing crazily the way Supergirl and the other brainwashed
Legionnaires did in the original, of course.
* The pocket universe Superboy. About as good a patch for the
editorial-dictated lack of a Superboy post-_Man of Steel_ as could
be asked for.
* Brainiac 5 developing time travel because of Supergirl, knowing
all the time when she'd die. (Now that I think about it, this is
the one gap that Laurel Gand doesn't fill.) Explains a lot about
the two's history, even the Supergirl robot in _Superboy_ #204,
which really belongs in the next section.

* Legion retcons I like or am indifferent to (but understand others'
dislike for):

* Proty II inhabiting the revived Lightning Lad's body. Yes, it's a
TMKism, but it actually does explain Garth's erratic behavior,
starting with _Adventure_ #332's "The Super-Moby Dick of Space,"
and the notion that Imra fell in love with Garth/Proty when Garth
alone hadn't been enough to cause her to return his instant
infatuation with her doesn't trouble me.
* Cosmic Boy becomes the Time Trapper. It fits with Rokk's
long-established interest in history and the heroic age of
superheroes. The idea that his clumsy attempts to fix history
resulted in his villainy works, and is no worse than an
age-regressed Element Lad turning the Trapper's spaceship into candy.
* Fortress Lad. The story's moving pathos makes up for it, and the
premise is certainly no sillier than the Silver Age stories it
clearly paid tribute to.

* Worst Legion retcons/plot expositions (not in any particular order,
except the first, and not any old bad story/character, like
Dr. Mayavale or the Space Circus of Death):

* The Shvaughn/Sean profem nonsense. Wins by a country mile.
* Anti-Lad. Stupid, pointless story.
* The Legion taking drugs that greatly extended their
lifespans. Understandably never referred to again by Levitz, the
story's own writer.
* The cell bank that produces 24-hour clones. Again, never referred
to again.
* Eltro Gand inhabiting the revived Mon-El's body. I can't fully
explain why this TMKism doesn't work for me when Proty II is
acceptable; perhaps it's because I don't see anything particularly
erratic about Mon-El's behavior post-Eltro Gand except for the
very understandable reaction in v3 #23 to a forced return to the
Phantom Zone.
* R. J. Brande as a Durlan who is Chameleon Boy's father. Him being
a Durlan is OK, but Reep's father, to boot? I've always believed
the idea was born of the necessity of the otherwise-pointless
_Secrets of the LSH_ delivering some Big Secret, however
dubious. I do like TMK's story fleshing out the idea, though.
* v2 #295. The idea of Universo as a former Green Lantern quite
sound, tying in his undeniably-strong willpower. The story's
raison d'etre, to explain why Green Lanterns aren't allowed on
Earth (Or is it United Planets space? I can't recall; Rond Vidar
says in v3 #51 that he's staying out of the UP entirely.) is a
dumb one, one which the lame story does not redeem at all. (For
that matter, just where did the "no Green Lanterns allowed on
30th-century Earth" idea first appear, anyway? Was it this very
story, in fact?)

[Yeechang Lee]

Post by Yeechang Lee
* Worst Legion retcons/plot expositions (not in any particular order,
except the first, and not any old bad story/character, like

[...]

One obvious one I missed is Laurel Kent as a Manhunter. Not a bad
story over two v3 issues, actually, but it's a bad idea nonetheless,
and causes problems with the "Who Shot Laurel Kent?" story from just a
few years earlier.

[YKW (ad hoc)]

Post by Yeechang Lee

Post by Yeechang Lee
* Worst Legion retcons/plot expositions (not in any particular order,
except the first, and not any old bad story/character, like

[...]
One obvious one I missed is Laurel Kent as a Manhunter. Not a bad
story over two v3 issues, actually, but it's a bad idea nonetheless,
and causes problems with the "Who Shot Laurel Kent?" story from just a
few years earlier.

As I just wrote in another context over at Major Spoilers, =ANY=
reference to MILLENNIUM, no matter how obscure or oblique, should be
considered awful. Not one single thing that came out of that "event" can
be considered positive, let alone explicable. (30th Century science
couldn't spot a robot a mile away???)
--
------------------- ------------------------------------------------
|| E-mail: ykw2006 ||"The mystery of government is not how Washington||
|| -at-gmail-dot-com ||works but how to make it stop." -- P.J. O'Rourke||
|| ----------- || ------------------------------------ ||
||Replace "-at-" with|| Keeping Usenet Trouble-Free ||
|| "@" to respond. || Since 1998 ||
------------------- ------------------------------------------------
"DC, currently, is run from the top down in a way that makes Jim
Shooter’s aegis at Marvel look like a hippie commune."
- Chuck Dixon, COMICS SHOULD BE GOOD, 14 June 2008.
<http://tinyurl.com/5rxsvp/#comment-665962>

[Michael S. Schiffer]

Post by YKW (ad hoc)
...

Post by Yeechang Lee
One obvious one I missed is Laurel Kent as a Manhunter. Not a
bad story over two v3 issues, actually, but it's a bad idea
nonetheless, and causes problems with the "Who Shot Laurel
Kent?" story from just a few years earlier.

As I just wrote in another context over at Major Spoilers, =ANY=
reference to MILLENNIUM, no matter how obscure or oblique,
should be considered awful. Not one single thing that came out
of that "event" can be considered positive, let alone
explicable. (30th Century science couldn't spot a robot a mile
away???)

I don't think the story was actually *good*, mind you, but the
Manhunters did have something of a technological head start.
(Didn't they first rebel somewhat before there was multicellular
life on Earth?)

Granted, they didn't seem to do all that much with the time, given
their showing against 20th century Earth. And building in an
actual vulnerability to Kryptonite is pretty dumb even given
Laurel's supposed cover story, necessary only because they had to
cover actual events from Laurel's original, superior character
concept.

Hmm... I guess that's a question: given that Levitz felt obligated
to provide a sacrificial lamb for _Millennium_ ("One of these
people has waited a^Wtwo thousand years to betray humanity")-- and
that he didn't feel he could just cheat and invent a Rocket Red #7
for the purpose a la Giffen-- whom *should* he have tossed on the
grenade to save the platoon? Assume it has to be a friend or ally
of the Legion's, of, at minimum, Laurel Kent's level of prominence.

I'll propose Roon Dvron. He was probably the least interesting of
the various SP supporting characters (I'd rather keep Zendak,
Shvaughn, and Gigi). It would also dovetail with his first
appearance: he betrayed the Legion and helped Universo escape,
because the latter had saved his life once. A random act of
kindness by a villain... or was there more to it, perhaps relating
to the millennia of conflict between Universo's old outfit and the
Manhunters?

Mike

[OM]

On 17 Jul 2008 15:14:33 GMT, "Michael S. Schiffer"

Post by Michael S. Schiffer
I don't think the story was actually *good*, mind you,

...The only thing that "Millennium" gave us was a different take on
how the Universe is run on Integer Math. The only previous successful
attempt was by Harry Nillsen when he explained how One is the lonliest
number, while Two can be as bad as One. Ironically it took Three Dog
Night to spread that gospel around.

OM

[Yeechang Lee]

whom *should* he have tossed on the grenade to save the platoon?
Assume it has to be a friend or ally of the Legion's, of, at
minimum, Laurel Kent's level of prominence.
I'll propose Roon Dvron.

[...]

Very clever. However, I've always thought that if there has to be
someone sacrificed to the gods of company-wide crossovers, it ought to
be someone that really matters. Dvron I'm not sure qualifies, and I'd
say Laurel Kent's level of prominence is the absolutely-positively
rock-bottom minimum-required level. A Rond Vidar, a Shvaughn Erin or
GiGi Cusimano (seducing Legionnaires in order to learn their secrets),
a R. J. Brande impersonator.[1] A Legionnaire would've been best from
a dramatic perspective, though. Invisible Kid II (who sabotaged
Brainy's use of Computo technology in order to ultimately save the day
and receive memberhip), perhaps, or Wildfire (the real Drake
Buroughs/ERG-1 never having returned from his debut adventure, you
see).

[1] TMK would have made R. J. Brande a Manhunter from the start, with
the Legion founded for the covert purpose of serving as the ultimate
weapons against the Guardians.

[Ken Arromdee]

Post by Yeechang Lee
Very clever. However, I've always thought that if there has to be
someone sacrificed to the gods of company-wide crossovers, it ought to
be someone that really matters.

This assumes that company-wide crossovers really matter.

[Michael S. Schiffer]

Post by Yeechang Lee

whom *should* he have tossed on the grenade to save the
platoon? Assume it has to be a friend or ally of the Legion's,
of, at minimum, Laurel Kent's level of prominence.
I'll propose Roon Dvron.

[...]
Very clever. However, I've always thought that if there has to
be someone sacrificed to the gods of company-wide crossovers, it
ought to be someone that really matters.

That's pretty much the opposite of the approach I was taking, which
was to treat the crossover-mandated sacrifice as damage to be
controlled as much as possible. Creating a new character for the
sole purpose of burning on the crossover's altar, like Kole for the
Crisis on Infinite Earths, or Rocket Red #7 for Millennium, is
going too far-- Levitz probably would have considered it cheating.
(He took his obligations to be a team player seriously. Likewise,
he wouldn't have gone for the "Oh, that's just a sideshow, here's
the *real* problem" used by Moore when dealing with the Crisis in
"Swamp Thing", and to a lesser extent by Morrison with the Invasion
event in "Animal Man", amusing though those were at the time.)

But by its nature, crossovers like this interfere with the
development of storylines and characters, and there's no way to
really integrate them-- doubly true for books like the Legion (or,
when it was around, All-Star Squadron) that don't even share a time
period with the main DC books. So my aim was to find someone who
genuinely met the need (rather than an "old friend" no one had ever
heard of before this storyline), but who would hurt the overall
book as little as possible.

I suspect that Laurel was chosen because the Superman editors
didn't like her existing anyway, so getting rid of her that way
killed two birds with one stone. But I'd rather than Levitz have
played for time, the way he tried to by keeping GLs in the 30th
century (even though the Corps as it had been was gone
"permanently" according to the 20th century book), or the way the
Supergirl statue stayed in Legion headquarters during much of his
post-Crisis run.


Dvron I'm not sure

Post by Yeechang Lee
qualifies, and I'd say Laurel Kent's level of prominence is the
absolutely-positively rock-bottom minimum-required level. A Rond
Vidar, a Shvaughn Erin or GiGi Cusimano (seducing Legionnaires
in order to learn their secrets), a R. J. Brande
impersonator.[1] A Legionnaire would've been best from a
dramatic perspective, though. Invisible Kid II (who sabotaged
Brainy's use of Computo technology in order to ultimately save
the day and receive memberhip), perhaps, or Wildfire (the real
Drake Buroughs/ERG-1 never having returned from his debut
adventure, you see).

Those would have taken the Millennium premise more seriously, I
grant. But IMHO, it would have done the LSH book no favors going
forward, and it wouldn't really have helped Millennium. That stood
or fell according to what happened in the main book and the 20th
century headline titles, not an epilogue a thousand years after its
events. (And we can only be grateful that Levitz didn't feel
compelled to show the New Guardians trying to run the universe in
the 30th century.)

Post by Yeechang Lee
[1] TMK would have made R. J. Brande a Manhunter from the start,
with the Legion founded for the covert purpose of serving as the
ultimate weapons against the Guardians.

I could see that-- or the Wildfire thing, given their antipathy for
the character.

Mike

[David Goldfarb]

[Paul Levitz] wouldn't have gone for the "Oh, that's just a sideshow, here's
the *real* problem" used by Moore when dealing with the Crisis in
"Swamp Thing"

While I have no actual evidence for it, I'm convinced that the
storyline in _Swamp Thing_ was pretty much what Moore was intending
from the start. He wove threads from "Crisis" into his cloth, but
the design remained the same.

[Michael S. Schiffer]

Post by David Goldfarb

[Paul Levitz] wouldn't have gone for the "Oh, that's just a
sideshow, here's the *real* problem" used by Moore when dealing
with the Crisis in "Swamp Thing"

While I have no actual evidence for it, I'm convinced that the
storyline in _Swamp Thing_ was pretty much what Moore was
intending from the start. He wove threads from "Crisis" into
his cloth, but the design remained the same.

I think that's probably true. But still, the treatment of the
Crisis was dismissive in a way that was more Moore's choice than
dictated by the plot. (Constantine could as easily pointed out
that the Crisis was being thoroughly attended to, where the threat
of the Brujeria wasn't. Or the Crisis events could have been
shoved between issues, though I'm not sure there was enough down
time in Swamp Thing to permit that.) Moore's a genius (as witness
the number of subsequent DC stories that have spun off of throwaway
ideas of his) but he's not really well-suited to writing in concert
with others where he's not in charge of the overall plot. The
"whatever, now let's get to the important stuff" worked within
Swamp Thing, to establish Constantine's character and the stakes
they were playing for. But it didn't match well with DC's intent
to make the Crisis *the* major event at the time.

That said, Moore's Swamp Thing was great, where Crisis on Infinite
Earths was merely very good, and a lot of the other crossovers were
pretty forgettable. So Moore's take was defensible. (Not to
mention that he was likely annoyed that he had to interrupt his
building tension and gothic atmosphere to cut to a crowd scene of
costumes on a satellite.) It just wasn't the sort of thing a
committed team player like Levitz would consider doing.

Mike

[OM]

Post by David Goldfarb
While I have no actual evidence for it, I'm convinced that the
storyline in _Swamp Thing_ was pretty much what Moore was intending
from the start. He wove threads from "Crisis" into his cloth, but
the design remained the same.

...And when you get down to it, the ending of that whole "American
Gothic" storyline still managed to make sense insofar as a "Crisis"
tie-in went, and vice versa. The Multiverse was no more, and the
Universe *had* changed, and having the two sides of "good" and "evil"
clasping hands in a sort of "understanding" meshed well with the
feeling of unification that "Crisis" was supposed to bring. However,
the only problem that I saw was that the next time we were shown the
two hands clasping, they weren't shaking on anything, they were arm
wrestling. When I first saw that, the first thing that popped into my
mind was wondering whether the winner got what we'd now call today a
"pimped-out" Cabover Pete so he could take his son along while he
hauled freight around the country. Somehow I suspect that wasn't part
of the Bearded Wonder's plan.

OM

[OM]

On 20 Jul 2008 01:35:10 GMT, "Michael S. Schiffer"

Post by Michael S. Schiffer

Post by Yeechang Lee
[1] TMK would have made R. J. Brande a Manhunter from the start,
with the Legion founded for the covert purpose of serving as the
ultimate weapons against the Guardians.

I could see that-- or the Wildfire thing, given their antipathy for
the character.

...Two points:

1) Another "throwaway" loophole would have been to use the *first*
Invisible Kid, Lyle Norg. The catch would be that when he died getting
squashed by Validus, he got pulped far more graphically than what we
saw Mike Grell depict. So instead of an autopsy being performed - thus
eliminating the issue with Laurel - he was simply scraped up off the
30th Century equivalent of the pavement, spooned into a rocket and
shot off to Shanghalla. This would have allowed a "Millenium"
crossover to be shoehorned in, but not enough to derail whatever
plotline was going on around then.

2) The issues the Bierbaums had with Wildfire bring up another
argument point I've had with new creators taking over an established
book. If they're not willing to keep around a fan favorite character
and write the character properly, then don't take on the assignment.
Granted, this would have gotten rid of Giffen when it came time to
kill Karate Kid for the first time, but the Bierbaum's dislike of
Wildfire was just plain retarded. It was the sort of
"holier-than-thou" fanclique attitude that's pretty much eternally
banned any APA writers from taking over the Legion. From what I've
heard over the years, the next time DC will consider letting an APA
writer even *pitching* a story, much less getting a regular "Legion"
gig, will probably occur about a decade after the first tales of the
Legion are considered historical tales of an alternate past.

As pointed out way back when it was just rec.arts.comics no bleedin'
a, b, c, or *, there's no such thing as a bad character, only a lazy
and/or inept writer(*).

(*) Yeah, yeah, I know. Remember, this was just before Vibe came
around, and I always defended Brother Power. After all, he was the
subject of my one pitch to DC back in early 1982 :-)

OM

[Dave Van Domelen]

Post by YKW (ad hoc)
As I just wrote in another context over at Major Spoilers, =ANY=
reference to MILLENNIUM, no matter how obscure or oblique, should be
considered awful. Not one single thing that came out of that "event" can
be considered positive, let alone explicable. (30th Century science
couldn't spot a robot a mile away???)

SECRET INVASION - it's just like MILLENNIUM, but without as much
mysticism!

Dave Van Domelen, would say "I can't believe it took me this long to
notice the parallel," except that he's suppressed memories of Millennium
pretty well.

[Michael S. Schiffer]

Post by Yeechang Lee
...
* The cell bank that produces 24-hour clones. Again, never
referred to again.

It was referred to in one of those "secrets of LSH headquarters"
spreads. It was also, IIRC, implied as the origin of the SW6
Legionnaires (and maybe BION) before the time travel origin was
subbed. (I'm 99% sure that there was a secret Dominator document
referring to acquiring the Legion cell bank in the back of one of
the early v.4 issues.) Note that the young Tom Bierbaum had a
letter published calling the issue in which the clones first
appeared one of his favorites.

Post by Yeechang Lee
...
* v2 #295. The idea of Universo as a former Green Lantern
quite
sound, tying in his undeniably-strong willpower. The story's
raison d'etre, to explain why Green Lanterns aren't allowed
on Earth (Or is it United Planets space? I can't recall;
Rond Vidar says in v3 #51 that he's staying out of the UP
entirely.) is a dumb one, one which the lame story does not
redeem at all. (For that matter, just where did the "no
Green Lanterns allowed on 30th-century Earth" idea first
appear, anyway? Was it this very story, in fact?)

I'm pretty sure it was. Presumably it was in response to the
question (whether Levitz's own or readers') why, given that the GLC
was a billion years old and had universal jurisdiction, we hadn't
seen any GLs in Legion stories thus far.

Mike

[Yeechang Lee]

Note that the young Tom Bierbaum had a letter published calling the
issue in which the clones first appeared one of his favorites.

Huh. That certainly ties in with many peoples' observations that the
Bierbaums' run emphasized obscure old throwaway ideas and fandom
speculation that fascinated super-obsessed longtime fans like
them--hobby horses, if you will--extrapolated into stories. This is
the opposite of, say, Levitz, who to me seems to have worked from a
top down approach: A big theme (not a plot point), like "Darkseid
attacks the UP" or "Universo takes over Earth again" and then fills in
the gaps from there.

The funny thing is that the Bierbaum run worked better this way,
too. People generally like v4 #4-5, which came (if I recall correctly)
from an unexpected editorial mandate that in a Legion without a
Superboy Mon-El had to go. The Bierbaums' fandom background clearly
helped in coming up with neat ways to obey such dictates by rewriting
continuity--resulting in the Glorithverse and Laurel Gand; heck,
turning a super-obscure one-issue minion into a recurring Time
Trapper-class villain is a genuine achievement--even while it hurt by
also letting the dumber fandom ideas run rampant.

Maybe a simpler way of putting is that the Bierbaums were great at
rewriting and reusing continuity, but awful at creating wholly-new
continuity.

(For that matter, just where did the "no Green Lanterns allowed on
30th-century Earth" idea first appear, anyway? Was it this very
story, in fact?)

I'm pretty sure it was. Presumably it was in response to the
question (whether Levitz's own or readers') why, given that the GLC
was a billion years old and had universal jurisdiction, we hadn't
seen any GLs in Legion stories thus far.

As has been pointed out Levitz was answering a question he himself set
up a few issues earlier, during the Great Darkness Saga. It's still a
subpar effort for Levitz, though, because it does not effectively
explain why the United Plants would turn down any outside help for the
gravest threat to the UP's history.

[OM]

Post by Yeechang Lee

Post by Michael S. Schiffer
I'm pretty sure it was. Presumably it was in response to the
question (whether Levitz's own or readers') why, given that the GLC
was a billion years old and had universal jurisdiction, we hadn't
seen any GLs in Legion stories thus far.

As has been pointed out Levitz was answering a question he himself set
up a few issues earlier, during the Great Darkness Saga. It's still a
subpar effort for Levitz, though, because it does not effectively
explain why the United Plants would turn down any outside help for the
gravest threat to the UP's history.

...Actually, the Legion by-laws had the nest explanation as to why
there were no GLs in the LSH: every member had to have at least one
unique super-power that was *not* the result of any sort of external
devices. The GLs used rings and power batteries, remember?

...There was an amendment of sorts that allowed for members with
identical powers to join if they proved their worth and/or those
identical powers had different weaknesses, but it was never made
"official" other than to justify having Superboy, Mon-El, Ultra Boy
and Star Boy with his original abilities in the Legion at the same
time. One could argue that having Garth and Ayla in the Legion right
after Garth was resurrected could apply, but her powers were changed
to those of Light Lass before this could be addressed officially.

OM

[Michael S. Schiffer]

Post by OM
...

Post by Yeechang Lee
As has been pointed out Levitz was answering a question he
himself set up a few issues earlier, during the Great Darkness
Saga. It's still a subpar effort for Levitz, though, because it
does not effectively explain why the United Plants would turn
down any outside help for the gravest threat to the UP's
history.

...Actually, the Legion by-laws had the nest explanation as to
why there were no GLs in the LSH: every member had to have at
least one unique super-power that was *not* the result of any
sort of external devices.

Except, oddly, for Wildfire, who without any devices falls somewhere
on the power scale around "resident of the Phantom Zone" (minus the
power over Jewel Kryptonite), and well below "Billy Batson with
laryngitis".

The GLs used rings and power

Post by OM
batteries, remember?

The question wasn't why there were no GLs in the Legion, but why GL
assistance was flatly turned down when offered during the Great
Darkness Saga.

Mike

[OM]

On 18 Jul 2008 03:13:34 GMT, "Michael S. Schiffer"

Post by Michael S. Schiffer
Except, oddly, for Wildfire, who without any devices falls somewhere
on the power scale around "resident of the Phantom Zone" (minus the
power over Jewel Kryptonite), and well below "Billy Batson with
laryngitis".

...There were hints during his first return in SLoSH #201 that he
possibly had some ability to merge with either living beings or
machines, but I can't recall which one. He tried to merge in some way
with Molecular Master, which didn't work quite right but was enough to
reveal to Drake that a) MM was a robot, and b) he was breathing toxic
fumes that would kill off everyone in the Legion HQ(*). Don't believe
they ever followed that one up other than perhaps with the friendship
he developed with Quislet. But that may be stretching it a bit.


(*) I almost called it a clubhouse :-)
OM

[YKW (ad hoc)]

Post by OM
On 18 Jul 2008 03:13:34 GMT, "Michael S. Schiffer"

Post by Michael S. Schiffer
Except, oddly, for Wildfire, who without any devices falls somewhere
on the power scale around "resident of the Phantom Zone" (minus the
power over Jewel Kryptonite), and well below "Billy Batson with
laryngitis".

...There were hints during his first return in SLoSH #201 that he
possibly had some ability to merge with either living beings or
machines, but I can't recall which one. He tried to merge in some way
with Molecular Master, which didn't work quite right but was enough to
reveal to Drake that a) MM was a robot, and b) he was breathing toxic
fumes that would kill off everyone in the Legion HQ(*). Don't believe
they ever followed that one up other than perhaps with the friendship
he developed with Quislet. But that may be stretching it a bit.
(*) I almost called it a clubhouse :-)
OM

He =was= able to animate Dirk's burned-out corpse for a time, with some
apparent help from parts of an old containment suit, so it's more than
just the one-off.
--
------------------- ------------------------------------------------
|| E-mail: ykw2006 ||"The mystery of government is not how Washington||
|| -at-gmail-dot-com ||works but how to make it stop." -- P.J. O'Rourke||
|| ----------- || ------------------------------------ ||
||Replace "-at-" with|| Keeping Usenet Trouble-Free ||
|| "@" to respond. || Since 1998 ||
------------------- ------------------------------------------------
"DC, currently, is run from the top down in a way that makes Jim
Shooter’s aegis at Marvel look like a hippie commune."
- Chuck Dixon, COMICS SHOULD BE GOOD, 14 June 2008.
<http://tinyurl.com/5rxsvp/#comment-665962>

[YKW (ad hoc)]

Post by OM

Post by Yeechang Lee

Post by Michael S. Schiffer
I'm pretty sure it was. Presumably it was in response to the
question (whether Levitz's own or readers') why, given that the GLC
was a billion years old and had universal jurisdiction, we hadn't
seen any GLs in Legion stories thus far.

As has been pointed out Levitz was answering a question he himself set
up a few issues earlier, during the Great Darkness Saga. It's still a
subpar effort for Levitz, though, because it does not effectively
explain why the United Plants would turn down any outside help for the
gravest threat to the UP's history.

...Actually, the Legion by-laws had the nest explanation as to why
there were no GLs in the LSH: every member had to have at least one
unique super-power that was *not* the result of any sort of external
devices. The GLs used rings and power batteries, remember?
...There was an amendment of sorts that allowed for members with
identical powers to join if they proved their worth and/or those
identical powers had different weaknesses, but it was never made
"official" other than to justify having Superboy, Mon-El, Ultra Boy
and Star Boy with his original abilities in the Legion at the same
time. One could argue that having Garth and Ayla in the Legion right
after Garth was resurrected could apply, but her powers were changed
to those of Light Lass before this could be addressed officially.
OM

Ultra Boy actually got in because of his penetra-vision and Thom made it
in due to the "electrical vision" portion of his temp powerset, not
because of any codicil to the LC, official or otherwise.
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- Chuck Dixon, COMICS SHOULD BE GOOD, 14 June 2008.
<http://tinyurl.com/5rxsvp/#comment-665962>

[Michael S. Schiffer]

Post by YKW (ad hoc)
...
Ultra Boy actually got in because of his penetra-vision and Thom
made it in due to the "electrical vision" portion of his temp
powerset, not because of any codicil to the LC, official or
otherwise.

Right, the charter basically said that it was okay to duplicate
Superboy or Supergirl (because they weren't full-time members), but
that didn't mean it was okay to duplicate, e.g., Mon-El.

Though a page I read a while back pointed out that the "no duplicate
powers" rule coalesced relatively late, probably sometime in the 70s.
A lot of things that were read back as applying it (e.g., Dream Girl
changing Lightning Lass to Light Lass) included no mention of such a
rule at the time, and there was no move to kick Ayla out when Garth
came back. The only rule relating to powers during the Silver Age
was that the member have one super power. (Implicitly, then
explicitly, not device-based. Later "at least one", but for a while
Superboy was the only explicitly multi-powered member, and Superboy
would sometimes marvel at how great the Legionnaires were despite
each having only one power each.)

Mike

[OM]

On 17 Jul 2008 13:31:01 GMT, "Michael S. Schiffer"

Post by Michael S. Schiffer
Note that the young Tom Bierbaum had a
letter published calling the issue in which the clones first
appeared one of his favorites

...You know, it's ironic that some fans who have letters printed in
the lettercols, and then are hired to actually *write* the book in
question tend to totally clusterfrack the book. The Bierbaums are one
example, while Rachel Pollack comes across as being an even more
pathetic one. She wrote a letter to "Doom Patrol" during Morisson's
run, wound up getting the writing gig, and ran the book into the
toilet trying to make it a platform for her own difficulties in being
accepted as a transgender - something most fans didn't find out until
*way* after the book was canned. The only reason I kept buying it was
for the Ted McKeever art, which has a quirky, semi-minimalist style
that I enjoyed enough to overlook the fact that practically every
Pollack DP story was about Dorothy's inability to find a tampon big
enough to handle the mess. It was, now that I think about it, the
opposite of how I handled the first DnA years on the Legion by reading
the story and ignoring Ol' Scratchy's inability to draw with anything
other than a dead toothbrush.

...On the other hand, there *have* been letterhacks who made good in
the industry. Marty Pasko and the late, great E. Nelson Bridwell come
to mind, and ISTR Mark Waid may have had a few letters printed. I know
Mark *Wade* did - Mark runs astronautix.com, the best online space
history encyclopedia(*), but a long time ago he suggested a character
called "Evolvo Lad" - but he never went into comics professionally,
but one *could* argue that since he details a lot of history on the
clusterfuck known as the Soviet Space Program in the 1960's - which
was just as big a debacle as the TMK run - he's qualified either way
:-)

(*) Warning: First-time visitors should be prepared to spend several
days surfing, because that site is *THAT* damned addictive!
OM

[OM]

On 17 Jul 2008 13:31:01 GMT, "Michael S. Schiffer"

Post by Michael S. Schiffer
I'm pretty sure it was. Presumably it was in response to the
question (whether Levitz's own or readers') why, given that the GLC
was a billion years old and had universal jurisdiction, we hadn't
seen any GLs in Legion stories thus far.

...As for why the GLs got banned from Earth, IIRC it had to do with
the Corps interfering with the Time Institute's attempts to view the
origin of the universe, which as we all know causes lots of Infinite
Crises. The GL in question was Vidar, who'd gone corrupt and the
Legion had to put a stop to him for the first time. However, the
fallout was that Earthgov banned all GLs from Earth because Vidar
showed they couldn't be universally trusted.

OM

[Barry Lyga]

Post by Yeechang Lee
Random thoughts that spring to mind as I once again reread my complete

[SNIP]

Post by Yeechang Lee
* v2 #295. The idea of Universo as a former Green Lantern quite
sound, tying in his undeniably-strong willpower. The story's
raison d'etre, to explain why Green Lanterns aren't allowed on
Earth (Or is it United Planets space? I can't recall; Rond Vidar
says in v3 #51 that he's staying out of the UP entirely.) is a
dumb one, one which the lame story does not redeem at all. (For
that matter, just where did the "no Green Lanterns allowed on
30th-century Earth" idea first appear, anyway? Was it this very
story, in fact?)

My first recollection of it being mentioned is in LSH Annual #1, when
Computo takes over the headquarters. The Green Lantern Corps contacts
the President of Earth and says that the Guardians are going to send
Sector 2814's GL to Earth just in case Computo escapes the HQ. The
President refuses the assistance and, when called on it by an aide,
snaps "The law says no Green Lanterns on Earth, and you know why!" with
a footnote from the editor to the effect of, "And you will, too, reader,
when we get around to telling the story!"

No idea if Levitz had the story in mind already or was just dropping a
reminder to himself in the script, but I suspect it's the former, given
how far in advance he tended to plan things.

[OM]

Post by Yeechang Lee
* Has anyone ever connected Cosmic Boy becoming the Time Trapper with
the Hag (AKA Mysa Nal)'s painting in _Adventure_ #351 prophesying
his future fate, which Miss Terious (AKA Dream Girl) prevented Rokk
from seeing as it was "too dreadful"?

...General fan consensus was that this "too dreadful" future was
realized when his mom got fried in that terrorist attack, and Pol got
seriously burned.

OM

[OM]

Post by Yeechang Lee
* Fortress Lad. The story's moving pathos makes up for it, and the
premise is certainly no sillier than the Silver Age stories it
clearly paid tribute to.

...Thanks, Yee. I'd gladly forgotten that story until you brought it
up.


OM