Random Happenstance

I don't usually post these necessarily in the order I wrote them, but I suppose I might have to in this case, since honestly, I'm still on Alpha Flight #20? I'm looking right at it, and I'm still hard-pressed to tell you what happened that issue, let alone the entire series. Offhand, I think the art style never gelled for that type of book, and the cast of characters didn't help: it really could've been pared down some. Maybe one or two new members instead of the four or five they had along with a relatively-benign government handler and a bad one...too cluttered, too many plates spinning. Whatever they were doing wasn't working, which is probably why it was cancelled, huh? 

While I've already blogged a number of them, there's a long box full of last issues here. I'm always keeping an eye out for them, but there are a bunch that who knows if I'll ever get around to talking about. Or, more accurately, I don't know if I can work myself up for. Despite Orion #25 being one of my favorite single issues, let alone last issues; I have a seeming plethora of New Gods and Mister Miracle finales that I can't get excited about. I've mentioned before, I have an almost instinctive revulsion to the Beast/Iceman/Angel run of Defenders: I have a vague idea what happens in the last issue from old Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe entries, and we don't wanna get into that. In the same vein, although I know it's way more readable: Peter David's last issue of Supergirl. Hey, remember when Supergirl was a glob, then like an angel or something? Well, here's where we throw all that away! Hope you didn't get attached over the last eight years or so! Have some alarmingly skinny jailbait instead... 

All right, settle down. I do this blog to remember these comics, not to cause myself psychic harm or anything. Let's grab one and...oh, grife. Spoke too soon. From 2008, Legion of Super-Heroes #50, "Enemy Manifest, conclusion: Hack the Infinity Net!" Written by "Justin Thyme," pencils by Ramon Bachs, inks by John Livesay. 

We'll probably look at the plot, but first, missed opportunities and diminishing returns. This was the last issue of the so-called "threeboot", the third version/second reboot of the Legion of Super-Heroes--and the second time Mark Waid had rebooted the team, since as that link points out, he had been involved in the post-Zero Hour reboot! With artist Barry Kitson, the main difference in this continuity was that instead of a relatively benign, Federation-style future; the threeboot was set in a less-utopian, somewhat repressed and stifling culture. All the better for the youth to rebel against, some (with powers) by joining the Legion as superheroes to inspire and make a difference, and their (largely powerless) fans and supporters, the Legionnaires; who are largely considered a cult by the authorities, parents, and other adults. Supergirl from the present (post-glob) would join the team and headline the book starting with #16, for about 20 issues; then I'd guess the Superman-editors wanted her back. With issue #37 the book was the Legion's again, under former writer Jim Shooter; and pretty sure it became a lot closer to what a Legion comic had looked like one or two reboots ago...Unfortunately, the book was cancelled somewhere in the middle of what Shooter had planned as an 18-issue arc: he was asked to boil it down to a big finish, but told them no, so this was pieced together from his notes, but he wanted his name taken off it. 

Oh, here comes another depressing comic math story problem: the Legion debuted in 1958, ran until Zero Hour in 1994. (Side note: I actually love Zero Hour. Seriously.) 36 years, then. Reboot version, 1994 to the Teen Titans/Legion special in 2004. Ten years. The threeboot started there, even if the first issue of the series was 2005, and ran until here, 2008. Three, four years? Then Final Crisis: Legion of 3 Worlds, and I'm going to reference the Wikipedia entry here: the post-Infinite Crisis era from 2007-2011, which I think was like a pre-Crisis version; then the New 52 Legion/Legion Lost. 2011-2015, although that includes appearing in Justice League United, the actual series barely made two years. Then the Bendis Legion, from 2019-2021. Wait, that was like 12 issues, shouldn't that have been just a year? Like they keep spinning shorter and faster, burning out quicker. 

At this point, it's long past time to stick a fork in continuity. Instead, give the Legion what Batman gets; creators that have a story to tell but don't necessarily have it fit in with everything. That and I would have random versions of the team show up and hassle Booster Gold or Impulse--or both!--way more often.