Supplement to the Addendum to the Review of the Legion of Super-Heroes (SARLSH), Part Two, By Johnathan

INVISIBLE KID II

There is a rule that I just came up with: Invisible Kids have lousy costumes. The original, Lyle Norg, had that brown-and-green workout outfit with the headband and all and poor Jaques up there has that yellow-and-black monstrosity. Heck, even the current, totally rebooted and up-to-date and not dead Invisible Kid looks like he just grabbed four or five random things from his closet and called it a costume. It's kind of like they want to be sure that their power will be appreciated every single time that they use it. "Oh, thank Space-God, Jaques. That thing was starting to sear my retinas."

Jaques Foccart got to be the second Invisible Kid basically through random chance. He had come to Legion HQ to get Brainiac 5 to make his sick sister well and then Computo had shown up again and possessed said sister, possibly using nanotechnology. Since Jaques had no powers or anything, Computo just totally ignored him to focus on beating up Legionnaires and in the confusion our pal drank some of the original Invisible Kid's formula (that was just, you know, lying around) and saved the day somehow (it's been a while since I've read the story, okay?). Computer-tyrants take note: underestimate Frenchmen at your peril. Afterward, Jaques joins the team and does okay. Oh, and at one point he starts teleporting as well as turning invisible and ends up in some weird hellscape and finds out that poor Lyle Norg didn't end up boinking some ghost-babe for the rest of time but rather was suffering eternal torment, which was a bit of a bummer.

I like that Invisible Kid II was named Jaques Foccart, because I was an English major and so occasionally read it as Jaques Focault, who would have the combined powers of Jaques Derrida and Michel Foucault, and have a giggle while I imagine him deconstructing the semiotic of the super-hero team (or something like that. I was an English major a while ago). Also, he's from Côte d'Ivoire and as far as I know is the only superhero ever to come from there. Dammit, except for his sister, eventually.

This picture, however... eesh. I kind of hope that it was accidentally released unfinished, because invisibility is really the easiest power to illustrate ever. Just make the outline of his legs dotted instead of solid about halfway down and then ask the colourist to fade out the yellow at about that point. Ta-da! You did it! Alternate method: leave the whole panel blank. As it stands, this is just terrible as a showcase for the character. I mean, when Superman has a shot where he's just standing there with his arms folded, he's at least hovering a foot or so off the ground, right? Take some notes, Jaques.

Invisible Kid II had two modes: brooding and surprised. In the first, he thought a lot about how his sister was sick (she was in a tube for a couple of years before Brainiac fixed her) and how invisibility was a lame power, which showed that he didn't think about the implications of having superpowers so much as read old Maxim articles about lame super-heroes. Don't listen to them, man! Sure you can't fly through the sun, but the sun's boring. You can fly through, say, the changing rooms of the stars. Plus, you can punch villains on the back of the head, which I for one have always wanted to do to Universo. In the other mode, Jaques shocased the fact that he wasn't a super-scientist or an adventurer or something, just some guy who had drank some goop. Every time that Validus or Darkseid or whoever would show up he would jump about a foot and shout "WTF!" Okay, he would shout "Sacre coeur!" but the spirit of the thing was the same. For me, it never got boring.

And that's pretty much that, Invisible Kid II-wise. Except to note that of all of the bad hairdos, post Five Year Gap, his was the worst. Still, on the balance:

JOHN APPROVED

Addendum to the Review of the Legion of Super Heroes: Part 1, By Johnathan

A while back I did a great big review of the whole durned Legion of Super-Heroes, circa the "Origins and Powers of the Legion" pages that ran way back when. Well, not long after I published that post I found another of those crazy things, in Legion of Super-Heroes v3 No. 17, and since that one included all of the pre-Five-Year Gap Legionnaires that I hadn't already covered I figured that I should probably do some sort of follow-up post. Kind of leery of long posts, though, so I've broken this one in two. First up: Legionnaires that I've already reviewed! Because what's obsessive completeness without, uh, completion?

BRAINIAC 5

You know, it's really hard to think up new things to say about Brainiac 5 when he's just standing there. That's what comes of a guy not having a costume change for 20+ years, I guess. The boots are nice and it looks like he's been working out, so that's two things. I suppose I can mention that I like the 'no black lines, just colour' style of forcefield more than the sheet of glass-lookin' ones that tend to show up in forcefield-centric comic books. I don't like this one, though. Purple forcefields aren't as good as green ones.

NOT APPROVED

CHAMELEON BOY

Probably my least favourite Chameleon Boy pic, both because of the costume and the 'how do his powers work' bit. Okay, I guess the costume's not too bad but it's definitely super-horrible with regards to palette. It's like, um... it's like Color Kid involuntarily used his powers whilst a sneeze/belch/hiccough combo was ravaging his cranial cavities - it's super-ugly, yo. Similarly, this "Let's slap CB's head on a little monkey-thing! It shows that they're the same guy!" approach to the whole issue of how to demonstrate his powers in a single panel seems even more ham-fisted than that one panel from the Sixties featuring him as an exposition-spouting garbage can. Bah!

NOT APPROVED

COLOSSAL BOY

See, Chameleon Boy? Speed lines help! They show us that Colossal Boy's getting bigger and they could've showed us how you were getting all transformative! Though in Colossal Boy's case, a wee little Gim Allon standing between his feet would've been nice. A new reader could potentially draw the conclusion that they were about to read a tale about someone who had the fantastic ability to emit gusts of wind from their fists, armpits and groin. And the only place that you're going to find that kind of action is in John and Paul Present: The Adventures of the Mighty Turbine! I like that they didn't alter his costume just for the sake of doing so - it's definitely better than the current incarnation - but I think that I might be pining for his old singing cowboy-style gloves for the rest of my life.

JOHN APPROVED

DAWNSTAR

Decent picture of Dawny in space, no real alterations to her costume (though they may have added some more fringe, I'm not sure). Not too much to talk about here, really. I mean, her wings look like they're made of papiér maché, that's one thing., but it's not really what I'd call a conversation-starter. I'd really like to know what she's looking at, though. I mean, she flies around in the depths of space fighting super-villains, 9-5: what's really going to shock her that much? My guess? A left-over missile from the Great Darkness Saga, shaped like a giant, nude, anatomically-correct Darkseid and spewing laser fire from horrible, horrible places. That, my friends, would be a hell of a sight.

JOHN APPROVED

DREAM GIRL

You know, until I took a close look at this picture just now I had thought it a pretty standard Dream Girl image. But now? Now I see that it's terrible. That's probably the worst rendition of the Dream Girl shiny one-piece that I've ever seen. It looks like it would require a whole roll of that special supermodel-brand double-sided tape to hold in place. Plus, I think she's wearing a cup. Bleh, I say. And while I'm bitching: whatever happened to that blue thing that she used to wear in her hair? That thing was great! It looked like a wireless cell phone headset, like she was constantly networking or prepared to network. Super-proactive! This all-glam look just doesn't have the same kind of synergy. Dream Girl is unlikely to land that big new client, and that's a shame.

NOT APPROVED

ELEMENT LAD

Despite the fact that I'm no big fan of Interlac, I appreciate the thought behind changing the 'e' on Element Lad's chest to it's fakey future language equivalent. I was about to say that I wouldn't run around with the Cyrillic letter j on the front of my shirt, but that's a complete lie, unless Cyrillic is one of those alphabets that don't acknowledge the majesty of the j or, you know, admit to the existence of the sound. In any case, Element Lad manages to rock the pink costume far more thoroughly than Cosmic Boy ever did. I, uh, I don't really know what he's doing in this picture, though. I can only guess that he's turned an oxygen atom into one of Element 476, Gigantium (discovered c. 2674 CE), an atom notable mainly for being almost ridiculously huge.

NOT APPROVED

LIGHTNING LASS

So at some point Light Lass got her original powers back and became Lightning Lass again. This worked well because Lightning Lad had just retired, so the Legion was still able to say that it had lightning-slinging capabilities. And I guess that the ol' Light Lass powers weren't as useful as they could be. Trouble is, lightning is kind of a boring power to have - that's why Lightning Lad had the cape! It added flair! Lightning Lass' costume needs flair. Or zazz. Or possibly some moxie.

NOT APPROVED

MON-EL

Mon-El’s another one of those cats who hasn’t changed his uniform in… ever. Admittedly, it is a pretty snappy bit of cloth – Daxam surely must have the best-dressed astronauts around. Plus, you’re bound to get attached to a tunic after wearing it for a thousand years whilst being verbally abused by ghostly assholes. I’m sure that both of those big gold buttons had its own name and complicated backstory by now and that for a while the cape was a serious competitor for Shadow Lass’ affections. I’m also sure that the ‘underwear over tights’ look doesn’t go well with this costume – so sure that I sort of blank the fact that Mon-El indulges in this abominable practice from my mind and have had more than one nerd-argument over the question of whether Mr. Gand wears ‘em inside the pants or not. Looking over my records, the answer turns out to be: both, on occasion. I believe that I have a comic shop employee to apologise to.

This is a perfectly nice picture of Mon-El, by the way. Except... Ol' Lar here has always been a character that manages to look cool despite the fact that he has a really bad haircut. This is, however, no reason to make that haircut the focal point of the image. It's like there's a hair-helmet coming to crush us, on its way to woo the Bouffant. Aiee!

JOHN APPROVED

Grr. My life has become too busy for long posts. I'm gonna break this up a bit (not like the last time, I promise - this time I'll finish). Tune in soon for Phantom Girl!

The latest in High-Tech Communication: Continuing Review of Adventure Comics No. 337

I don't know how I feel about the ol' super-shout. On the one hand, it'd be nice to know what Superboy was up to at any one time but on the other: burst eardrums. I don't know. I kind of figured that after Brainiac 5 got finished with creating those y'know, rings, the ones that let you fly, he might have devoted a half hour or so to banging together one or two walkie-talkies. I mean, I know that Silver Age Superboy had to use all of his powers as frequently as possible while talking about what he was doing or he'd lose them, but couldn't he think of the children, and also the old people and the pets and everyone else?

I like that Superboy can't just say "Great guns!" or something. He's too large for that - he needs to swear by something really, really big. It's all "Great galaxies!" or "By the rings of Saturn!" or even "Great Krypton!", which always gives me a chuckle. I hope swearing by places you were born or used to live comes into vogue soon, so I can shout "Great Windsor!" or "Holy Halifax!" or even "By the temperate climate and great dining opportunities of Victoria!" when I get surprised by seeing some of my pals taking a nap.

Adventure Comics No. 337, REVIEW DEFERRED, still.

Action Comics No. 860 is out this (wait.. last) week. There's not much new to say about the Legion of Super-Rejects (though I was surprised to see that it wasn't just a trick of perspective - Golden Boy's pants really are that high-waisted) but I'm pleased to report that my dream of a comic in which Shadow Lass and Night Girl are working as the most obvious team ever has finally come to pass, and it only took thirty or forty years!

JOHN APPROVED

Shooter coming back to the Legion? Ask me in a few more issues.

Aliens and Their Schemes: Review of Adventure Comics No. 337, Part 2

*I accidentally published this before it was even started and I'm far too lazy to upload all of these pictures to another post, so enjoy what I've written so far. I'll be hitting 'Publish Post' periodically as I write.

Update: busy week! Christmas parties and other such social engagements, oh my! Plus I seem to have managed to start dating a girl. Never fear, though: it'll be done before Christmas.

Other update: One last push! damn tiredness! Damn crankyness! Do it, Johnathan! Do it for all those kids out there that won't have a proper Christmas unless they know how the middle part of this comic ends and what your thoughts on that are! Get in there and review!

Fourth update: I am a broken man with a full social calender. Looks like this might have to wait another day or so to be finished. Sorry, forks.

Updated update: bah. time to try something new. See the end of the post.

Here I am, back again to discuss the middle portion of Adventure Comics No. 337. As you may recall, when we left the Legion they were agitated over the threat of a possible invasion of the Earth by sickly-looking aliens. Meanwhile, romance was in bloom at Legion HQ and Brainiac 5 wasn't too happy about it. Awright, let's get back to the action! Er, I mean, the adventure!

So, the aliens are all worked up about a secret 'Plan-R' that the Legion claims is a foolproof fail-safe in the event of a war of the worlds or what have you. Since they have all superpowers, the three orange-clad chaps figure that the simplest way to find out what Plan-R is is to grab a Legionnaire and extract the info.

I've got to say: without the yellow skin these guys look a lot like older versions of Eddie Munster. Maybe their planet is like one of those worlds on Star Trek where the whole society is based around a spy novel or gangster films - maybe these guy come from the Munster Planet and the Eddies are the military branch of their society. They should totally be wearing his short-pants getup instead of orange jumpsuits, though.

And that's why Saturn Girl is the Legionnaire not to ambush. She's always able to call for backup - come on, Eddies, do a little research before you set out to kidnap a lady. Didn't Grandpa teach you anything?

I've said it before and I'll say it again: if I'm ever knocked out I sincerely hope that I'll have to presence of mind to mutter something about how I'm losing consciousness before I go under. Especially if it's something unlikely, as the more information that you manage to squeeze out before going down for the count, the more points that you get. Xaxan there managed an Analysis of What Hit Me followed by a Double Status Report, which is pretty good if this is his first time.

This panel isn't terribly funny but it's kind of important to the plot, so here it is. Yup. Everyone's looking pretty sharp here - classic costumes, real big forehead on Superboy...

Moving on:

One thing about that old rocket-shaped headquarters: it wasn't very big. You were practically guaranteed a crowd for any important announcements you wanted to make, even if it was mostly male Legionnaires with nothing better to do. Take note: it's not explicit here but that old Legion bylaw about married members getting chucked out on their ears is cropping up. Because there's no room for partnerships in a team, right?

That's actually a really lovely drawing of Phantom Girl. Just sayin' is all.

Legion wedding preparations:

Girls' side first: I think that what Saturn Girl is saying that her crazy, mixed-up planet/moon Titan has the way-out, super-alien tradition of... an official of some sort conducting the ceremony. Uh, wow... that's super crazy and futuristic, Titan. Way to try. I mean, you could have went the same way as the Bismollians and had some sort of talking dog do the deed, but you stuck to your guns. Your incredibly boring, individually-numbered, matte gray guns.

Looking forward to seeing Phantom Girl's dress, though. I hear that it's beautiful.

Boy's side: Jewel Painting, meh. Giant pearls (or possibly giant pears), meh. Wait a second...

INITIATE EMERGENCY MINI-REVIEW

INITIATING...

FUTURE ZOO: REVIEW OF HOUSE PET FROM PLANET KAVOON, BY JOHNATHAN

So all kinds of planets sent wedding presents to Saturn Girl and Lightning Lad, eh? Jewel paintings and giant pearls/pears and, uh, golf trophies, possibly. And then Mon-El shows up on planet Kavoom with his arms full of the jeweléd treasures of the galaxy and - and I'm just guessing here - they collectively go "Oh crap, we knew there was something that we had to do today. Uh, hold on." And then they collectively grab the first thing that they can get their collective hands on, toss it in a sack and send Mon-El packing as quickly as possible.

I don't like the looks of this thing, frankly. It's got creepy ears. It's got to be the Kavoomian equivalent of a sewer rat or something, that or Kavoomites are freaky-ass people. Look at the way it's sizing Lightning Lad up. It's getting ready to either eat him or rob him. No, the House Pet From Planet Kavoom (incidentally, the title of a long-running series of holo-horror films on Kavoom's nearest planetary neighbour) is completely

NOT APPROVED

RESUME MAIN REVIEW

Now, the first time that I read this I missed the comment that Saturn Girl made about wedding wands earlier and I thought that the little action-figures-on-sticks thing was some sort of doofy Legion tradition. Not that that didn't make sense, though, what with the Legion's habit of making new statues of themselves at the drop of a hat. In fact, speaking of hats, I am more than a little surprised that there's not a Silver Age tale in which Superboy shows up in the future only to find all of his pals walking around wearing hats that look like themselves for some Holiday of Tomorrow.

Phantom Girl's dress, by the way? Stunning. It's amazing the effect a veil can have on the outfit that you wear every day. Sheesh. Was she afraid that Ultra Boy wouldn't recognize her without a big 'P' on her chest? Actually... it is Ultra Boy we're talking about here. And the official? Didn't disappoint. Dull as powdered fruit punch.

When I get married/if I ever get married I'm going to try my damnedest to have all of my groomsmen carry a little action figure of themselves on a stick and then present them to me at the end of the reception. This will have two effects: firstly, having a wedding tradition that can be traced to a single issue of a 1960s comic book will firmly cement my position as King of All the Nerds. Secondly, the question of what exactly to do with five or six action figures on sticks with no practical use but high sentimental value will be a recurring theme in my marriage, coming up at least as often as we move or rearrange the furniture. Heck, it might come up in the divorce proceedings.

Here's where we get into the original reason for this interminable review. Switching to Super-Human Detritus mode... now!

So, following the double wedding (and double honeymoon? Scandal!) and subsequent resignation of Lightning Lad, Saturn Girl, Phantom Girl and Ultra Boy, the Legion finds itself short-handed and sets up a try-out (hooray!)!

This is my favourite thing in the whole comic: that the idea of whole planets dressing in exactly the same clothing had become so accepted in Legion of Super-Heroes comics that the Eddie Munster Squad figured that by turning into three white guys with different hair and clothes no one would ever think to connect them with each other. I bet that there were all kinds of crazy ceremonies and ritual punishments associated with wearing the costume of another world, like how Canadians give a formal spanking to anyone from another country that they catch wearing a toque.

The failing applicants at this try-out are all members of the Legion of Substitute Heroes. My thoughts on this stalwart bunch are detailed elsewhere, so I've omitted most of 'em. As an example, however, I present the panel featuring the love of my life (were I 2-dimensional and nine hundred and some-odd years into the Silver Age DC Universe's future and not in competition with a human magnet and not dating a lovely Nordic lass), Night Girl!

You're a fool, Brainiac 5! A fool!

*ahem*

Moving on yet again:

The aliens-in-disguise show up to show off. First up is Size Lad, who can change the size of things. Hmmm. Um... well, it's a super-power, I guess. Really, though, this guy should be the proud new owner of a Legion Consolation Flight Belt. If my dear Night Girl can't get in, there's no reason that this schmuck should. In what situation (and keep in mind that I will disregard all reasonable suggestions) will this power prove useful to the Legion? Perhaps they will go to the beach and wish to show a little more skin and so ask Size Lad to shrink their bathing suits down for them? Perhaps they'll get an unusually small sandwich at the Food-o-mart? Bah.

Even though he's got an impressive profile, Size Lad is

NOT APPROVED

Well, I can't very well object to Blackout Boy's powers, seeing as how I like Shadow Lass so much. I can, however get all snotty about the fact that after admitting this guy no one from the Legion thought to run out and grab Night Girl. Someone who's super-powers only work in the dark plus someone who makes darkness? Those are what's known as complimentary powers, kids. Grr grr grr. A very spiteful

NOT APPROVED

From what I understand of Magnetic Kid's powers, he's got a pretty limited palatte of solutions to choose from in the event of a problem. Is it time to break up a bar fight? Well, they can't keep fighting if they're in a big pile on top of Magnetic Kid! Fatal Five attacking? Not from on top of Magnetic Kid, they're aren't! Got to stop a giant robot? Don't look at Magnetic Kid, sorry. "Pulling people toward me" really doesn't seem like a Legion-worthy super-power, unless of course they expect to be having a lot of tugs-of-war in the near future.

I do like how he messed with Brainiac 5 there, though. So:

JOHN APPROVED

Well, this isn't working. Much as I hate to bite Blockade Boy's style, the only way that I'm going to finish is by working on a panel or two at a time. Fun!

My behavior: NOT APPROVED

Adventure Comics No. 337: REVIEW DEFERRED

Review of Adventure Comics No. 337, part 1, By Johnathan

This was merely going to be a plain old ‘Super-Human Detritus’ review of three nutty Legion applicants, but upon rereading the issue of Adventure Comics that they made their shameful appearance in I discovered that it was an almost quintessential Legion story, jam-packed with far-future hijinks! And so I present to you a review of the whole damn comic, including all manner of interesting asides.

(Later) It was also going to be one long review, with maybe thirty images and so forth, but it turns out that I'm still recovering from the weekend. Prepare for installments!

The tale opens with an exciting, action-packed board meeting! Today’s topic: the weekly invasion of the Earth. First, though, we need to decide who’s bringing what to the Klordny Day potluck. Sun Boy, are you still bringing the condiments and napkins? Terrific.

Man, I wish that this wasn’t just a colouring error and that Brainiac 5 really did turn grayish-purple when he got angry. It would lend a whole new dimension to his super-logical behavior of later years. “Brainiac, are you sure that you’re not mad about how we ate all of the jelly doughnuts while you were in the bathroom? Because you’re starting to look like a week-old eggplant again.”

But seriously, Brainiac, do you honestly expect to have a long strategy-oriented meeting involving twenty or so teenagers of various genders and maintain the room’s full attention the whole time? My friends are all in their mid- to late twenties and I have a hard time getting them organized to do something that they want to do, let alone listen to me give a long speech about threats to our security (not that that stops me from giving such speeches). You’re just lucky that Ultra Boy and Phantom Girl aren’t furtively groping each other under the table whilst Sun Boy and Superboy ignore you in favour of a detailed conversation about how their moustaches are coming in.

I’m assuming that these two panels are just here for exposition purposes and not to show that Brainiac 5 went around after the meeting delivering his speech to every Legionnaire individually. Plus that’s an awkward sentence being spewed forth by Superboy in the second one. Although, come to think of it, it might be fun to do, say at work (“I, the editor, will use my Bachelor of English to search for extraneous punctuation.”) or at the comic bookshop (I, the giant nerd, will use my Blogger account to bitch about Countdown.”). It could clear up a lot of ambiguity about people’s upcoming goals and the means by which they will achieve them!

I love the old standby of making something alien by making it super big, like that wedding ring. But honestly: who sets up an exhibit on marriage customs in a museum for use by a group of people who aren’t allowed to get married? If I could think up any super-villains who were also museum curators I would certainly be suspicious (Composite Superman? Dammit, no. He was a museum janitor). Well, it was someone with a mean streak, anyway.

Also, Lightning Lad is an idiot. Robot arms make you way more loveable, man. It’s like, a million times more extreme than that lip ring/soul patch combo you were thinking about.

Oh, how I love the Phantom Girl/ Ultra Boy duo. Look at him: that’s possibly the goofiest, most lovestruck expression I’ve ever seen in a comic book. That big dumb ox is just so darned endearing.

You know, I’d think that Brainiac 5 might be more interested in harnessing the crazy energy that everyone was giving off in that first panel, instead of being all snarky. I mean, necking teenagers as a power source? The implications are mind-blowing!

I like these aliens because they mostly just look like someone kept messing with a drawing of a regular guy until he looked slightly inhuman. “Let’s see… give ‘em big ears, an overbite, a widow’s peak, heavy brows… aaaaand… jaundice. Yeah, that’s pretty otherworldly.”

Huh. Turns out that the first third of this story's mostly setup. Well, I assure you that there will be action aplenty in our next installment, along with even more nitpicking and taking things out of context!

Adventure Comics No. 337, you'll get your judgement when I get some more plot.

REVIEW DEFERRED