Learning to Love the Legion

Today's blog is about a current phase in my comic book reading life.  (Note I said "comic book reading life".  When current phases in my regular life take an upswing, you all will be the first to know.)  There's been a group of superheroes that I've only had passing encounters with throughout my life.  I believe I may have first encountered them in "Crisis on Infinite Earths #12", and it wasn't until my very early teenage years that I finally bought a book featuring these particular characters.  But in the past few years, I've been trying to reconcile some of my questionable feelings about this particular team, and find my joy in their adventures.  I speak of the heroes of the 30th Century, those teens... or maybe twenty-somethings at some points... that preserve peace through an entire galaxy.  I speak of the Legion of Superheroes.

For a brief... VERY brief... history lesson, the Legion was first introduced in "Adventure Comics #247", when the title was helmed by Superboy.  (You know, the one that isn't a super-powered baby that drives me nuts.)

R.J. Brande, a wealthy man of the 30th Century, seeing young heroes in action saving the general populace, decided to fund the activities of a galaxy spanning force for peace and justice in the universe.  As one can guess between the "Who's Who" entry picture, and the first appearance picture, their ranks have grown just a smidge between the years.  Also, a fun thing about earlier stories featuring the Legion; if you wanted to know what time they resided in, just add 1,000 years to the current publishing year of the book you're reading!  I credit various podcasters that have talked about the Legion for that factoid. 

Now for my OWN origin story with the Legion.  As mentioned in retrospect, I did first seem them upon a random purchase of "Crisis #12".  It's funny, in a way, that that was my one and only issue of that series.  I came in for a universal shift in the DC continuity... RIGHT at its conclusion.  Obviously, so many characters in that issue I was left blanking on... including a bunch of young heroes chilling with Brainiac and Darkseid, as they watched the final confrontation between the combined might of established heroes and the Anti-Monitor.  I would like to say this was the definitive "Legion" moment for me, but again, they were just random characters at the time I had zilch ideas or conceptions about.  No, my first real taste of the Legion came from a local comic shop I used to visit when the concept of allowances first entered my life.  I came up with the notion that if I bought older comics with higher page counts, I was stretching my dollar that much more.  Truth be told, no one can blame me for that reasoning!  And at said store, they usually had GREAT prices on used copies of "DC Best of Blue Ribbon" digests.  I believe they were a buck a pop!  So 100 pages for a dollar... I'm actually STILL sold on that concept.  I grabbed any digest I could get my hands on... even that weird "Strange Sports" collection which featured a headlining story of the DC Heroes in a baseball game against the DC Villains.  But this is also what lead me to my first REAL travel into Legion lore...

The members of the Legion, from my first impression, sometimes bordered on the pleasantly accepting... to the downright incredulous.  ("Bouncing Boy"?  Really?  And this "Proty 2" thing they let hang around?  A glob of snot is NOT a pet.)  But that particular digest, with a solid block of continuous adventures involving a group of assassins, and the villain group I seem to establish foremost with the Legion, the Fatal Five, was certainly enough to whet my appetite for a larger slice of the DC Universe.  The only issue was... it was just a whetted appetite, not an outright ravening hunger.  I picked up a few more of the Legion-centric digests, but that's about it.  Never explored their regular title.  My next phase in Legion interest came about 14 years later, when "Final Crisis" launched, and that deluge of spin-off mini-series that were in connection... however tenuous... to the main series.  One such series I KNEW I wanted to pick up was written by one of my then-favorite writers, Geoff Johns, and featured penciling chores by the nigh-divine George Perez.  I speak of "Final Crisis: Legion of Three Worlds".

Now THIS was probably my main portal into mere passing interest to a more desirous path to finding out more about what Legion may come after such a mega-event.  After this mini-series wrapped, I did actively follow the Legion title until its very destruction under the nuclear bomb that was the "New 52".  The unusual thing was I was totally for following the adventures of the new version of the Legion, but I didn't exactly see why I should backtrack to the supposed "glory years" of the team.  Not until one Christmas, when two dear friends of mine gifted me with three tabloid-sized comics from the 70's.  (And because of that, they also instigated my current interest in trying to collect tabloid comics...)  One was a Marvel "Conan" treasure, another was a DC "Ghosts" anthology... but one was wholly original material, and you can guess who was featured in it...

Now THIS book, with it's stunning artwork by Mike Grell, and fun story by Cary Bates, was the book that now has me currently exploring those periods of the Legion's past that I have neglected.  But you know, I've not yet illustrated what my initial issues with the Legion were... and still are obstacles I've yet to overcome.  I'll keep this brief:

• The size of the group can sometimes make it difficult to keep track of team members... despite how individualized they are.
• Their adventures seem to be more "personal" in detail.  It doesn't seem like they tackle tasks that affect other people all too often.
• I still can't get over some members' validity, or the perceived ridiculousness of their powers.
• Not exactly a consistently stellar rogues' gallery.  Maybe that first Fatal Five exposure spoiled me?

But what keeps me going, and curious, are these positive factors... on which I end this article on!

• Personal conflicts are allowing me to learn more about team members, which is filling my knowledge gaps.
• Thankfully stories don't throw ALL members of the team into the mix at one time.
• Reoccurring villains that do show up have started to interest me.  Bring on more Legion of Super-Villain stories, already!
• I'm also starting to accept some initially doubted characters.  Oddly enough, I want to see MORE Bouncing Boy.  But shame that the period I'm reading from has him separated from the team.
• Being a purely male sexist comic reader, I dare say the Legion has the best ratio of hot female heroes in comparison to ANY existing team.  Seriously, fellas, check it out.