Legion of Super-Heroes #20 - "Vanishing World"

[perletwo]

Sorry I'm so late with this gang, had minor surgery this week that's slowed me down. However, here's 4 pages from LOSH #20, "Vanishing World," the latest installment of the Fatal Five saga.



We open with Glorith teleporting herself, Ultra Boy and Chameleon Boy onto the Sorcerors' World. Jo asks if she could teleport like that, why not use it before? Because it only takes her home, where Mysa has forbidden her to be, she explains. The ground is beset by tremblors, so they head for the White Black Witch for help.

On the Promethean Giant, Phantom Girl is still fleeing the Giant's scratching, and internally bemoaning what a disaster her term is: the universe is falling apart, Polar Boy and Invisible Kid have disappeared, Sun Boy is dead and she may be about to join them. Even if it means maybe never coming back, Tinya sees no choice but to phase back to her own dimension.

Invisible Kid may have had the same idea, even if accidentally:



This should be an interesting vacation, non?

Blok greets the Legionnaires while the Witch struggles to hold the planet together without losing her shit and letting Mordru loose. She shows them a vision of the Fatal Five, worlds dying, and the shuttle wreckage, and says she no longer feels Tinya in this universe. Jo is distraught.

Tharok continues bopping around the galaxy checking out his handiwork, starting with Validus:



Here, I believe, is where the credits thanks to "consulting deconstructionist Keith Giffen" comes into play. You'll recall that during the Giffen/Immonen "5-Years-Later'Verse," it was revealed that the Sorcerers' World had evolved from the downfall of Gemworld, and the statue of Amethyst still stood at the heart of the planet; Mysa bonded with the statue and claimed all Gemworld's power for an assault upon Mordru. This I believe is the DCnU's version of the Amethyst gem at the heart of Sorcerers' World.

But not without a fight - Blok, Mysa, Jo, Cham and Glorith all appear at the world's core to stop Validus. Blok tries valiantly to hold him off while Mysa works on a plan:



Tharok also checks in with the remains of Weber's World, where Mon-El is in stasis, Dream Girl is heartbroken, Harmonia is confused, the remaining Legionnaires are disheartened, and Brainy is downright scared, noting that they still have no clue as to the fifth member of the Five.

Mysa's worked her "now you see it" trick with the planet, but she didn't take everyone with them. Cham and Jo find themselves in the rubble of Legion HQ - but they're not there alone:




The plan, it seems to me, is not exactly coming together. Yet.

Tag notes: Mods, I accidentally clicked creator: francis manapul as well as actual artist Francis Portela's tag, can you delete? Also, I could've sworn we had a White Witch tag already?

Comments

[razsolo]

Portela's art is LUSH.

Plus he draws Jacques really ridiculously hot, which I am still not used to as I have never once thought of Invisible Kid as being one of the sexy Legionnaires with any other artist.

It's a shame Levitz's writing has been so terrible since the start of the last series....this series hasn't been as bad IMO, but it's still not actually GOOD either.....

[q99]

-
Plus he draws Jacques really ridiculously hot,-

He does ^^

[bruinsfan]

I thought Immonen did pretty well by him too back in the 90s.

[lieut_kettch]

And the dreads do work a lot better than the 'fro.

[superfangirl1]

I hope all is well with you post minor surgery. :)


The art here is fantastic. Who the guy with the Fe on his chest though.

[ozymanidas]

FerroLad
I think he's like colossus

[kamino_neko]

Ferro Lad, 2 words.

Also, Ferro Lad predates Colossus by the better part of a decade to be clear. (And, unlike Colossus, it's always been clear how Andrew's powers worked - he's living iron, thru and thru, no debate as to whether it's his whole body, or just an armour coating.)

He was the first Legion character to die and stay dead - Lightning Lad was the first to die, but he came back eight months later*, and Ferro wasn't brought back until the SW6 kids were introduced in the early 90s...

* This was later retconned to his body having been reanimated with Proty's mind (as his resurrection involved Proty sacrificing himself) in the 80s...current continuity ignores that era (thankfully...there were some good stories, and some good ideas, but there were a lot of mistakes, as well - that being one of them).

[kamino_neko]

Heh...looking up the dates of Garth's death and resurrection, I note two months before he came back, there was another story, which killed off - and then immediately resurrected - every single Legionnaire. (It was a Mxyzptlk story...when he was banished back to the Fifth Dimension, everybody came back to life, since it was his powers that 'killed' them.)

[kamino_neko]

Just for clarity's sake - that's a memorial statue of Ferro Lad, not the dude himself. [Edit - wait, I just noticed that the page with the memories/spirits of Ferro Lad, Invisible Kid and Earth Man was actually posted (not sure if I scrolled past it, or if it wasn't loading for me before), so...uh...ignore this.]

[perletwo]

Correct both times - there's a close-up panel on the page prior to the last one posted where it's very clear that that's Ferro Lad's statue.

[kamino_neko]

I think I messed up my explanation of my mistake. >_> I may need to sleep. *laughs*

I know that's his statue on the last page (I've read the issue)...I just didn't notice you'd posted the page of Jacques and Brek, so there was an actual appearance of Ferro Lad (sort of) not just his statue. (And, given his powers, it seemed, at that point, like a good idea to mention that was just the statue in the last page. ... Actually, it still does, now that I think of it.)

[practicalcat]

...Was the sexy-skewered-lady pose REALLY necessary? Ugh.

[salinea]

Tag notes: Mods, I accidentally clicked creator: francis manapul as well as actual artist Francis Portela's tag, can you delete? Also, I could've sworn we had a White Witch tag already?
Any poster can delete the tags on their own post.

[gamerguy]

Very nice call-out to the classic Invisible Kid's death story.

[perletwo]

And to the story in the 80s where Jacques and Wildfire visited this ghost-dimension once before. Seems to be some odd side-effect of the invisibility serum, I guess.

[kamino_neko]

Lu's injuries look weird. Like those bits aren't actually stuck through her.

[lieut_kettch]

Hopefully that's just one of her dupes. And the forced perspective initially made me think that it was Vi and a giant Persuader (does she have growth powers in this continuity?)

And they still use rebar in the 31st century?

[kamino_neko]

Lu's dupes are real, living people, and if they die, she's short one. (Has happened twice, though the first time, the dead dupe was revealed as not having died.)

[lieut_kettch]

I thought she gained the ability to create infinite duplicates after her last dupe died, as shown in Legion of Three Worlds?

[skemono]

TJ and Amal are dead!?

And part of the Legion??