Bittersweet. The Legion of Super-Heroes hurts like no other comic book. It’s not because it’s bad, but because it was so good. The Legion has been around since the 50’s as a foil for Superboy to have adventures in the far-off 30-th Century. Crisis on Infinite Earths eliminated that version of Superboy, but the Legion had been a strong enough concept to carry the title by themselves before that happened.
The LSH really came into its own in the 80’s under writer Paul Levitz teamed up with artist Keith Giffen. Levitz had been a former comic fanzine editor before becoming their writer. Giffen imprinted a distinctive style on the setting. The Great Darkness Saga really put the group on the radar of many comic book fans with a signature storyline. The Legion then became a deluxe title along with the best-selling Teen Titans and was even reprinted monthly for the newsstand.
The comic had several excellent artists under Levitz’s writing, but eventually he moved on to become DC’s publisher. The title was rebooted for the first time in the 90’s with “5 Years Later” setting. It started out still in continuity, but DC’s overall editorial changes forced some drastic and innovative changes that basically reset the title.
Giffen came back for the new title, but had radically changed his artstyle. The main problem, however, was that a couple of fans were given the writing reins. They weren’t as respectful as Levitz, as they proceeded to make every wild fan theory canon. It was bad enough that they had to create a second title with a clone Legion (which was another theory brought to life) to make adventures that still looked like classic Legion stories.
From there, I don’t even know. Every time DC made a continuity change for the overall line, the Legion suffered the most. They kept handing the title off to people who had some weird take on the simple notion of superheroes in the far future. I’ve sampled a couple of them (I can only find a review of one, 6-2-20).
Usually, the new takes wanted to fix the Legion’s intrinsic issue: most of the characters’ superhero names are kind of dippy with names ending in “Boy,” “Lad,” and “Lass,” to fit in with teenage Superboy. (Their actual names weren’t much better, if not worse.) This issue tied into the editorial decision to allow the Legion characters to age somewhat normally, which made the names even worse, but the changes never stopped there. The writers always wanted to stick in their personal take on the far future, which was usually terrible.
The Legion’s mis-continuity even became something of a company in-joke. Levitz even came back at one point to restart his continuity. He created a new character named “Earth Man,” for the project and I couldn’t take it seriously. The last Legion thing I saw was from DC’s 100-Page Giant line that included a classic-looking story (7-30-20).
Legion #303 wasn’t the first time I’d read a Legion story. (I think it was a story in Best of DC Digest.) My mom bought the issue for me at a 7-11 when I was sick, so it’s special and my favorite Legion comic. (It’s also great just by itself.) I still have a few random issues and a big black and white Showcase book from the 70’s. (I never reviewed it. It’s kind of great and kind of hokey.) I used to have a whole bunch of newsstand issues, some deluxe issues, and, regrettably, a lot of the 5 Years Later run.
The new CEO at my workplace invited my department to lunch and gave everyone a $20 Amazon giftcard. (He also gave everyone a free day off every month. He’s getting on people’s good side.) I decided to not sit on the card and to use it quickly. I still had the wish list from the last time I had a card, and I still couldn’t find anything on it. I got a ***Wonder Girl ****trade that I didn’t know existed until I suddenly thought to look for it. To finish the balance, I basically settled on getting this Legion trade.
There was a larger trade version of this story, about double the size, but I decided on just getting the core story. Even then, this trade adds in a prologue excerpt from another issue and a Legion annual that ties in the end of the story. (I think there was another annual that also tied back to the story.) Even with a double-sized final issue, just the four issues of the “saga” weren’t enough for a trade. I guessing the larger version adds in the 5 Years Later coda for The Great Darkness Saga, which was The Quiet Darkness. (Given that that story actually kills off Darkseid, you’d think it’d be more famous.)
I had a dog-eared used copy of the final issue of the saga, which I loved, but I don’t know what happened to it. I also had the included annual. I think I’d read the other issues somewhere, but I don’t remember if I owned them. (Have I owned another different version of this trade before? How embarrassing.)
When this came out at the time, the big deal was the identity of the villain. It’s not revealed until the end of the third issue. There’s plenty of easy clues, but maybe a lot of readers then weren’t familiar with Jack Kirby’s New Gods from the 70’s. Darkseid hasn’t always been the big villain he is currently. Since Darkseid is on the cover of this, it’s not much of a mystery now.
However, the story itself is still very compelling. There’s an ominous buildup, then a sudden dramatic escalation, and followed by a desperate final assault. The story moves along pretty quick from Mon-El and Shadow Lass encountering a dark world with advanced weapons. A mysterious entity awakens and creates servant creatures to collect various magical items, which are drained by their master. The escalation reaches a new level, as two of the Legion’s most powerful foes, Mordru and the Time Trapper, are drained of their power.
The Legion is running a step behind all of these developments, but manage to get to the Sorcerer’s World before the servants arrive. The Legion holds them off, until the Teachers on the world manage to summon a baby, which will somehow be the key to defeating the enemy.
Things then become much worse. After his encounter with Mon-El, the enemy is made aware of planet Daxam. He promptly enslaves all three billion inhabitants and then moves the entire world into orbit of a yellow sun. This creates a world with three billion people with the power of Mon-El and all under his control.
By this point, Mon-El and Superboy, the Legion’s heaviest hitters, have been knocked out. Brainiac 5 finally deduces their enemy is Darkseid, while his super-army is assaulting the entire United Planets. Every superpowered hero is called in on defense.
Darkseid is able to abduct the child from the Legion’s custody, but they are able to find him now. The child turns out to be Darkseid’s eternal foe, the Highfather. He summons Superman and Supergirl from the past and turns one of Darkseid’s creations into Orion, Darkseid’s son and enemy. Darkseid triumphs over them all.
The Legion finally directly confronts Darkseid, at which point the near-deity has a terrible revelation: he’s lost control of the Daxamites and they’re coming back with a vengeance. With that, he concedes defeat and disappears, but leaves the Legion with a curse.
In the annual two years later, Saturn Girl gives birth while a magical, dark cloud forms over the space station during an attempt to reawaken Mordru by his disciples. The baby is fine, but Imra thought she detected two babies. There were. Darkseid takes the other, changes him, and renames him Validus and sends him backward in time. Validus is a well-known Legion foe. Finally, we have an explanation of the strange giant creature’s odd power of projecting mental lightning. It’s a combination of his parents’ powers. (In a later annual, Darkseid returns Validus to human form and he rejoins his parents.) The annual is illustrated by Superman artist, Curt Swan, so it’s a bit of a jarring change in style over Giffen.
Reading this all at once (well, over multiple nights), the pacing really jumps out at you. If this were put out today, it’d be a year-long event. I’m kind of torn. The first three issues are almost perfect in their setup. The finale, though, was just too big for one issue, even double-sized, to tell. Moreover, the issue has a large number splash pages and pages with only a few panels.
Maybe it doesn’t truly convey the full scope and danger. Maybe at least one issue just dealing with the Daxamite invasion would have been warranted. On the other hand, Darkseid wasn’t messing around and the sheer panicked response make this a page-turner.
There are some bits of questionable story logic. I thought maybe I just wasn’t getting it from only having read the finale initially, but it is a bit squirrelly, which is one reason I wasn’t doing a detailed synopsis. Darkseid’s powers seem truly deity-like in this and you wonder how he apparently lost against the 20-th century heroes. The 30-th century didn’t seem to have any technological edge on him or better superheroes. The only thing stopping Darkseid was that he couldn’t handle multiple serious threats at oncem, because he kept wanting to torture his foes instead of finishing them. It is a great ending in that Darkseid’s own creation of a super-powered army is what ultimately defeats him.
So, it’s great. This edition isn’t really necessary if you’ve already read it. If you haven’t read any Legion of Super-Heroes (or worse, only the more recent versions), you’ll enjoy it, but will likely find it mostly incomprehensible. What would really be great would be something like an Epic Collection showcasing the Levtiz/Giffen era and then volumes featuring some of the other great artists that followed. And still, a lot of it would reference back to the mountain of continuity from preceding issues. No wonder there was such a dedicated fan community.
I’m not sure I should have gotten this over getting something I’d never read before. Even with the gift card, I had to fork out another $15 to get the two trades. Regardless, I don’t think I could have gotten anything more entertaining.
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