The Legion of Super-Heroes #8 – Review

By: Paul Levitz (writer), Yildiray Cinar & Daniel HDR (pencillers), Wayne Faucher & Bob Wiacek (inkers), Hi-Fi (colorist)

The Story: The Durlan assassination attempts continue, this time targeting their own people and the Legionnaires themselves.  As the team spreads even thinner to face the growing number of threats, they can only hope the newly elected Legion leader is up to the job.

The Review: If you ever become a fiction writer, in any medium, you’ll learn there aren’t many rules in the business, but here are two that are essential to the success of any story: whatever you’re writing, it must constantly be accomplishing one or both of two things—building character, or advancing the story.  This issue of Legion does none of the former and just a smidgeon of the latter.

In a way, it’s an achievement in itself how an entire issue can go by without accomplishing much of anything.  A new Legion leader is elected, but with no fanfare and without that leader (I’ll resist from spoiling even the leader’s gender) even present in the issue.  The Legionnaires fight several battles with more Durlan assassins and yet no new information about their mission or motivation really comes to light.  Well, except for Tellus’ telepathic probing of one of the murderous Durlans, which results in the following: “Even if only one of us lives, the United Planets Council will die.”  Dire as it sounds, it’s pretty much what the Durlans have been attempting to do the past couple issues without much success.

It’s really troubling how the characters show almost no personality in this issue.  Part of the problem is so much of their dialogue is expository, and that exposition only reiterates what’s already happening.  Their voices have so little character that you could pretty much replace any of the Legionnaires with any of the others and the story would hardly be affected at all.  All the dialogue has the same straightforward, urgent tone that lends well to melodramatically stating the obvious (“You are powerful, human—but you are not a true changer!”  “I can do anything you can, Durlan—and better.”)  I hate to use this word, but sometimes the characters simply sound stupid, as if despite the ten-century jump, their brains are as dry as croutons.

The Legion of Super-Heroes #2 – Review

by Paul Levitz (writer), Yildiray Cinar & Francis Portela (pencils), Wayne Faucher & Francis Portela (inks), Hi-Fi (colors), and Sal Cipriano (letters)

The Story: Earth-Man joins his first mission with the Legion as the Legionnaires deal with the fall of Titan.  Meanwhile, Saturn Queen returns to wreak havoc.

What’s Good: In his return to writing duties, it’s clear that no one gave Levitz the memo about decompression.  Thank goodness for that because the result is that the Legion reads like no other book on the stands right now.  This book is thick.  It’s a 30 page story, but that doesn’t do justice to how dense it is.  Levitz somehow manages to perfectly balance the Legion’s notoriously large cast with around four to five sub-plots.  Much like last month’s debut, it’s mind blowing how much actually happens this month as well as how many scene changes there are.  This issue is so ridiculously packed with content and story that were it $2.99, I’d feel like I was short-changing DC.

What’s particularly remarkable is that Levitz never loses control.  Things never feel scattered.  More remarkable still is that Levitz finds time for a good amount of characterization.  All of the many characters carry distinct voices.  Braniac 5 in particular remains a total blast under Levitz’s pen.

Much like Levitz wonderfully manages his multitude of characters, he also is able to make every single of his sub-plots engaging.  Every plot strand left me wanting to know more and left me wanting next month’s issue.  What the heck is going on with Saturn Girl’s kids?  What’s Saturn Queen up to?  What’s going to happen to Titan’s refugees?  Individually, each of these plots is standard fare, I suppose, but when weaved together, the result is overwhelming.  It’s really fun to find so many corners of interest in a single comic.

I also enjoyed Levitz’s use of Earth-Man even more than last month.  Indeed, Earth-Man, for me, is the most intriguing of Levitz’s many threads, if only because so many questions abound, particularly regarding his Green Lantern ring and what he’ll end up doing with it.  Levitz is quickly fashioning Earth-Man into a fully realized, three dimensional character who is showing the potential to be more than a simple, xenophobic asshole.

I have nothing negative to say about Cinar’s work on this book.  It’s clear that he was the right choice for the Legion and he manages the book deftly, with a good mix of modern sleekness and the old school vibe that’s a necessity for a sci fi book like the Legion.  It’s nothing overly fancy, but it also remains friendly throughout.