Legion nostalgia

[richardak]

So, apropos of nothing, I decided to post a few pages from an old Legion of Superheroes comic.  I honestly have no idea which volume this was, because the Legion's publishing history is incomprehensible to me at this point, but it was issue forty of the Giffen-Bierbaum-Bierbaum run. This was really the only version of the Legion I ever got into.  What I loved about it was that, in many ways, it was a product of its time, the late eighties and early nineties, in that it was very dark, grim, and gritty, but, at the same time, it was all those things in a mature, intelligent way. Unlike so many of the comics of that era, it wasn't dark just for the sake of darkness, or just to titillate readers with how "badass" the "hero" was.  It felt, at least to the kid I was at the time, like a genuinely mature, grown-up take on what had originally been a very childlike fantasy. Also, it was not unrelentingly dark and grim; the pages I'm posting are from a lighter moment.  

Anyway, to give some background, what's happened is that, in the midst of a terrible crisis during which earth was occupied by the Dominators, a second Legion, younger Legion was discovered.  It soon came out that, years earlier, the Legion had been captured and cloned, with one set being kept in suspended animation, while the other escaped and operated as the Legion, but no one knew which were the clones and which was the original (shades of Clone Saga, obviously).  The commercial reason for this was so that DC could publish two versions of the Legion, one the dark, mature one, and the other a more light-hearted, kid-friendly version.  Anyway, in this issue, the two versions of the Legion had the chance to meet and get to know each other, and see their older or younger selves.  And without further ado:



For the most part, the older and younger versions hit it off pretty well.  The biggest exception, at least at first, is the character these scans focus on, Shrinking Violet, a.k.a. Salu Digby.  This was probably due to the fact that she had undergone the biggest transformation, from shy, timid youngster to battle-scarred, crew-cut war veteran.  In this first scan, you can see young Violet cringing behind her boyfriend, wondering what would have motivated old Violet to cut off all her hair (it is a military haircut, because she served in the war between her planet, Imsk, and Braal, homeworld of fellow Legionnaire Cosmic Boy, a.k.a. Rokk Krinn; I told you it was dark).


Anyway, here we can see that young-Violet's boyfriend, Devlin O'Ryan, a.k.a. Reflex, wants to join the older version of the Legion and wants Violet to come with him.  She's obviously reluctant but is having difficulty making him understand that.



So then old-Violet, overhearing all this, comes over to offer her younger self some words of advice that give young-Violet the courage to assert herself.  There's so much subtext in the line where she tells young-Violet not just do what others tell her and to follow her heart, and I love how the panel prominently displays her scar.  She got that scar from her friend Rokk at the battle of Venado Bay in the war with Braal, a war that she didn't really want to fight, in which her people did terrible things, including the use of weapons of mass destruction; she nevertheless fought out of a sense of duty, and because she was at that time still too timid to stand up and say it was wrong.  It was only late in the war that she began to protest her people's actions.  I remember thinking that what she's really trying to do is give her younger self the benefit of her rather painful experience.  (Later, I realized that there might be another level of subtext to that line, but never mind.)  Anyway, I liked this because it encapsulated what I loved about this run of Legion: you have a light-hearted, sweet, funny, heartwarming moment that only works because of the dark, grim, gritty moments that had happened beforehand.  

Comments

[drtechnobabel]

See, this is what a lot of the big-name comics in both Marvel and DC are missing: balance. Without the lighter stuff, the dark and grim stuff tends to grate and become dull. And without these smaller, personal moments, the big events just blur together and lose their meaning. Of course, you don't want the balance to go too far in the other direction either, but I don't see nearly as many examples of imbalance on the light and whimsical side.

[q99]

I'd say Marvel's better in that area. Loki, Daredevil, She-Hulk, etc..

[richardak]

That may be true now, but it definitely wasn't then.

[q99]

Oh yes, the situation back then was very different, almost a mirror of now.

[drtechnobabel]

You're right in that overall Marvel is better at balance, but that's why I specified the big-name titles. With the 'lesser' characters and titles (just to clarify, what I mean by that is that they aren't considered to be the most popular or recognizable, not that they are actually inferior in terms of quality), the writers are more free to experiment with the characters and plot since Marvel is less strict with how said characters are portrayed. With big-name titles however (*coughcough*Spider-Man*coughcough*), the writer is given less leeway due to the executives having a certain idea for what a character is supposed to be or what they want to happen with the character, or the writer is someone they feel will portray the characters the way they want. While there are exceptions, this does generally seem to be the case with such headliner characters. And while they are fewer, DC does have examples of their own that achieve that balance, but again, they are either side titles or with characters that aren't considered mainstays.

[q99]

For the very-biggest name titles, sure, but Daredevil's not exactly a *small* name.

DC's medium tier is full of seriousness too, while Marvel doesn't have to get very far from the top at all.

[q99]

Good stuff :) Ah, remember the day when the Legion could truly carry multiple books?

[icon_uk]

This is from what is known as the 5YL era of the Legion, post SW6 introduction (the younger characters here, who might be the clones, or might be the originals) and a couple of years pre Zero Hour when the whole thing was rebooted.

The height differences seem a little extreme in some cases... did Jan really grow THAT much between joining and reaching adulthood? :)

One thing which I like which was, IIRC, hinted at in this iteration is that younger Shrinking Violet should actually be a good bit taller than she is here, and be closer in height to her older self, but because she's so shy, she uses her power to reduce her natural height a little to be less imposing.

I also like that older Vi doesn't impose anything else about herself on younger Vi, like mentioning the fact that she herself was now in a relationship with Ayla. She'd let her younger self find happiness without whoever SHE wanted.

This was also the introduction of the retcon that Garth Ranzz had been a lot more hot-headed and impulsive as Lightning Lad, and a more conceited and rather arrogant Sun Boy. In fairness at least gave them a little more individulatiy than they'd had before when Legion characters all had the same default setting of almost terminally pleasant and good natured... even Timber Wolf and Wildfire were only mildly hot headed.

Sigh... I MISS the Legion.

[q99]

I'm disappointed there's not more Legion material collected.

There's the old stuff and the threeboot, but I want to see 5YL and Reboot on my shelves.

[richardak]

I really wish they would collect 5YL in trade. I own the entire run in floppies now, but I would still buy the trades. Of course, I also wish they would finish the Justice League International TPB collections, and collect a number of other late-eighties and early-nineties series, even the ones I own in their entirety.

[q99]

Yes. 90s material is tragically under-collected.

[wizardru]

I truly loved the SW6 characters. I thought they were a great reboot-without-a-reboot version of the characters, making them fresh and (at the time) modern, while retaining some of the characters innocence. Imonnen's artwork also really sings, here.

Of course, I also enjoyed seeing the Subs become an effective guerilla fighting force against the Dominators, but that's just me.

[silicondream]

Yeah, I thought this period did a great job of differentiating Lightning Lad, Sun Boy and Ultra Boy as different types of "bad boy." Dirk was an entitled ass, Garth was well-meaning but wrestling with anger issues, and Jo was trying to figure out whether to exploit or abandon various survival skills from his (post-retcon) criminal past. This set the tone for their characterizations ever after, seems to me.

(Including Dirk's characterization as Sir Not Appearing In This Film for most of the reboot, because he'd been just so unpleasant before. But maybe he'll be less unpleasant if we reintroduce him as a girl? No, Inferno's pretty unpleasant too....)

Cera Kesh's origin as the second Emerald Empress, helped along in no small part by these guys, is just an awesomely horrid nugget of realistic teenage emotional dynamics.


Also, the conversation between young & old Element Lad above takes on slightly more meaning for readers who saw him come out as bi (more or less) during 5YL.

even Timber Wolf and Wildfire were only mildly hot headed.

Hee. "I'm a lone wolf, as the symbol on my chest indicates!" Bless your heart, DC house style that was crafted for an audience of autistic robots.

[philippos42]

Is this Stuart Immonen art?

[icon_uk]

I believe so, this is from around issue 40, and that is the time Immonen was on art for the series.

[richardak]

Indeed. I'll add the tag now.

[lieut_kettch]

Older Vi was with Ayla at the time, wasn't she?

[richardak]

Yes, although it was never made explicit that they were more than just very close friends, although it was made as obvious as could be short of that.