During holiday times, the Legion asks: "Peace on earth? What about everywhere else?"

[kingrockwell]

Continuing with our celebration of holiday times, we're only looking at one story today, featuring Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes!
There's Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez art!

"Star Light, Star Bright, First Star I See Tonight", from DC Special Series #21 (1980, the cover advertises it as the Super-Star Holiday Special), was written by Paul Levitz, with art by Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez and Dick Giordano (yeah, try beating that team for a classic Bronze Age story!). This is about four pages out of twelve.

Superboy's visiting for X-mas, so Phantom Girl and Saturn Girl show him various images of how holiday times are celebrated in the future.



Wildfire comes in and talks about how the diverse methods all convey the same classic message of "peace on earth", but Superboy just wants some damn tinsel!

Looking up to the stars melodramatically (you only wish i were kidding!) he gets an idea.

(i love how bored Saturn Girl is with the whole thing!)

So, they rope in Lightning Lad and take off in a Legion rocket. Projecting star patterns based on known history, they arrive at the likely coordinates of the star only to find no evidence of such a star ever having been there. They do, however, find a small planet. (though one must wonder how such a planet would survive without a star nearby)

It goes without saying that they take a look around.

Wildfire picks up the iceberg and melts the plankton out, but he knows it will only last them a few days, nowhere near as long as the ice age settling over the planet.
(i can never read this page without the Prime Directive nagging at the back of my head, i always almost expect it to be foreshadowing)


One of the creatures is stuck in the fire! They save it, but they can't do anything about the crops.


He digs into the ground for metal ore, which he shapes into cables to secure the nest.

Things're looking bleak planet-wide.


Superboy's got another idea! He takes a few of the telepathic earplugs they use to communicate in deep space and recalibrates them to serve as translators. Meanwhile, Lightning Lad and Wildfire start digging out a cave.


And with friends! Using the earplugs to communicate, the three races move into the cavern and form a new interdependent society so that they'll all survive.



...Didn't it?

There's a really neat subscription ad for the Legion's series in this issue, too, but my copy's in kind of rough shape, so I don't want to risk it too much by scanning it. Sorry guys.

Tomorrow: More shorts! These ones are all about Gotham City!

Comments

[silverzeo]

The Bond Fire Alien... are they the Wild Things?

[thokstar]

The concept of an SF look at the Star of Bethlehem isn't new (and in fact there's a fairly famous Arthur C. Clarke story about that concept, aptly titled "The Star". It's not necessarily something you want to read right before the holidays, however.)

[blakeyrat]

I think the Land Dwellers got off easy. "Yeah, all we gotta do is keep these fires burning and free chow, woo! We don't even have to gather the wood."

[crinos]

Hey, I learned something today:

1) Colossal Boy is Jewish.

2) Judaism will still be around 1000 years from now.

Also, I wonder if Chameleon boy feels left out his planet has no holiday?

[lonewolf23k]

Hey, Judaism's been around for thousands of years as it is. I have no doubt it can survive another millenium.

[cleome45]

Well, it's survived Madonna's fleeting interest. That's always a good sign. :p

[cleome45]

I'm guessing Cham was grumpy about it at the time, but after Gim's Mom sent him to jail and then later Gim hooked up with the hot girl from Cham's homeworld, he pretended that he had to go to work on holidays even if he actually didn't. :/

Hey, I'm still not used to not working on Christmas. (Long story.) So I can totally identify. Even if I've never worn a leotard with Pini epaulets attached. :p

[pallas_athena]

and then later Gim hooked up with the hot girl from Cham's homeworld

I never realised this before: Colossal Boy married out.

[cleome45]

Colossal Boy married out.

Not in the metaphoric sense, though.

(Ask any member of The Tribe who's felt inundated with Christianity at this time of year. Sometimes it's just easier to blend in and not have to give The 101 Explanation to a fresh crop of confused faces all over again. :/ )

[lieut_kettch]

So why does Gim stay giant-sized during his family Hannukah dinner? Wouldn't that mean he'll need more food than everyone else?

[perletwo]

Well IIRC most artists have tended to depict him as a big boy even in his natural state, and he's kind of playful about going back and forth between different sizes at random, moreso than other size-changers I can think of - more the Plastic Man approach to the powerset than the Hank Pym approach. So maybe the camera just caught him coming back from a superpowered boardinghouse reach?

[cleome45]

They need to bring his home perm back. Element Lad's, too. :D

[icon_uk]

Demonstrating the bareich that are his powers as an indicator of thankfulness?

Or maybe his mother, wants to show her son off to the girl who's there.

[jlroberson]

That's his little trick to get extra helpings.

By the way--apparently there's an equivalent of Christmas everywhere, but no Hannukah analogue.

I always wondered about that as a kid when I read this. The universe and aliens of all religions coming together to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ!

[lonewolf23k]

This reminds me of that story where Silver Surfer looks for evidence of the existence of the Star of Bethlehem, and discovers many other worlds have stories of such a star appearing at the same time, each connected to another good event.

[tacobob]

Give the gift of PANTS to your naked alien types. Remember. PANTS!

[pallas_athena]

I remember pants...