We return to the Giant-Size format for the series and I do hope it sticks around a bit longer than last time. Regardless, if you thought you would not see Karate Kid and Princess Projectra for a while after last week’s Karate Kid #10, think again! Both of them explode onto this landmark issue, which also serves as the official, legal change to a book about the Legion of Super-Heroes. To this end we officially sunset the original title for the letters page, Super-Talk, and replace it with the aptly named Legion Outpost.  

And what better way to commemorate this occasion than with Paul Levitz pushing the pedal to the metal with the return of the Giant-Size format of the book, albeit with one important difference. Instead of cramming one original story and a few reprints in one book, we actually get thirty-four glorious pages of a new Legion tale! And not just any Legion tale but a beauuuuuuuuuutiful one. James Sherman and Jack Abel show us what they got and what they got is good. This is the ultimate flex from these two incredibly artists thus far, which helps propel this issue to the land of the incredible. How incredible you ask? Read on to find out!

A Day in the Death of a World!

The Planet Mordan receives its death sentence. In twenty-four hours its sun will become a nova and a million Mordanites will burn alive. The Legion arrive on Mordan, charged by the United Planets with evacuating the entire planet. But as they begin their mission, a lone Legion Cruiser speeds through space, housing two Legoinnaires, Karate Kid and Princess Projectra. Princess Projectra is feeling a bit restless and would like some attention from Karate Kid before he returns to the twentieth century. Her needs are postponed as their craft pulls to an abrupt stop and Karate Kid realizes that they are ensnarled in a tractor beam. A mammoth vessel dwarfing the Legion Cruiser pulls it swiftly aboard and into a vast cargo hold.

Our two Legionnaires spring out from the craft and are ready for action and know that whoever they are facing, must operate on a big scale and be incredibly dangerous. A robotic voice rings out into the cargo hold noting KK’s complement. And to the horror of Karate Kid and Princess Projectra, two members of the Fatal Five, Tharok and the massive Validus, loom over them. Tharok notices Karate Kid’s confidence and assures him that even though he sees only two of them, they do indeed face the Fatal Five.

The Fatal Five, three words that can chill a whole city into silence or a single man, even one who can respond with action. Action made all the more desperate by the realization that he has a special duty to capture these villains, a task that he cannot accomplish. And as Karate Kid is thwacked by Validus, Tharok responds with his own attack, zapping Princess Projectra with an energy blast. 

Meanwhile we return to the planet Mordan. Colossal Boy, in gigantic size, is helping its population evacuate the planet by lifting them carefully into a series of space-ship arks spread across various launch platforms. Superboy asks for an update and if the arks are filling up quickly enough. CB responds with too quickly, for the population is obviously in full panic mode. He then asks Saturn Girl to broadcast calming messages in order to settle them down, but she responds that she cannot do it. She is busy trying to motivate the other half of the planet to report to their evacuation stations because they need to make sure all one million citizens survive and she just does not have the strength to do both.

To prove her point she once again goes into deep concentration and reaches out to the population of Mordan. It is a great strain for one of the founding members of the Legion but she manages to connect with all of them. She tells the people that the High Seer of Naltor, the Planet of Prophecy, had a vision of their sun going nova that would eventually destroy their planet. They only have hours left to evacuate and she begs them to come to the city and board one of the arks that they are building. She then collapses into the arms of Shadow Lass.

Meanwhile outside the city, the desperation is echoed by Ultra Boy who is currently helping Mon-El and Superboy build the arks. Noting their progress he is incredibly fearful that they will not be able to build enough in the time remaining. Superboy replies that they have no choice and they have to try, because no one else can. He reminds him that over half of the Legionnaires are on distant missions and are not available so it is up to them to finish the job.

We go outward through Morgan’s atmosphere and meet Brainiac Five and Element Lad who are performing a solar analysis in an attempt to isolate the element that is causing the nova reaction. Luckily Sun Boy is also there, whose powers enable him to cancel the threatening solar flares and shield his two fellow-Legionnaires. 

They continue their work when suddenly Sun Boy is blasted from behind by an intense green energy beam. Brainy turns and meets Emerald Empress and her Eye of Ekron. She taunts the three and casually mentions that she will use the eye to kill them all. Brainy is defiant and reminds her that they have defeated her before and they will do so again. The Empress sneers and orders the Eye to destroy them. 

Brainy quickly turns on his force shield belt and it withstands the first blast. Element Lad then swoops in and forms an inertron barrier around her, effectively blocking her from giving any further commands. With Emerald Empress and the Eye out of the way, they quickly attend to an unconscious Sun Boy. However, if they would pay attention to the Empress they would notice that the inertron barrier is starting to crack until it eventually shatters, freeing her. Seeing the shock on her victims’ faces she informs them that the eye always leaves a residue of power within her and it was enough to break the shield from inside.

Meanwhile, on the planet’s surface, Saturn Girl and Shadow Lass are also concerned with the imminent deaths of those Mordanites who have not yet reported for evacuation. Saturn Girl leads Shadow Lass to a small village and remarks that she senses helpless feelings from within and she does not know why. She opens the door and Shadow Lass quickly moves in front of her and scoops up what appear to be abandoned children in her arms. She is reminded of Saturn Girl’s disposition in not being able to understand feelings such as these, especially feelings of being alone, and afraid.

Saturn Girl shrugs it off and remarks that they are not here to adopt the children but to save them. Shadow Lass begins to tell her that she wishes she would open up more when the roof of the hut is ripped apart, revealing the monstrous Validus, the largest and most powerful member of the Fatal Five who is accompanied by The Persuader. The Persuader puts on his helmet and taunts them, telling them that he will use his atomic ax to end them once and forever. However, Shadow Lass quickly throws a shadow cone in his direction but his axe cuts through the darkness and just about misses Shadow Lass’ head, as she screams for help.

Suddenly, a red-and-blue figure soars onto the scene from half a world away. Mon-El, whose super-hearing summoned him to answer his beloved’s plea, and whose super-strength knocks the atomic axe away just in time. Chaos then breaks loose as Ultra Boy and Colossal Boy join the fray, giving the Legionnaires a five-to-three numerical advantage. But numbers are not the answer, for both Shadow Lass and Saturn Girl can only hinder Mano, the other member of the Fatal Five, while his hand’s deadly disintegrating power reaches out, trying desperately to destroy them. Nor is size the solution, for while Colossal Boy has attained Validus’ giant stature, he is no match for the mindless monster’s strength. No one knows where Validus was created or how, but in a moment he may kill his second Legionnaire.

Mon-El grabs Persuader from behind and tells Ultra Boy that they are getting nowhere but he does have an idea. Ultra Boy tells him to hurry up, and Mon-El flies around Persuader at super-speed, carving up the ground around him, until he is standing alone on a platform. Ultra Boy commends Mon-El for the quick thinking and they fly off to help the others. But Persuader is not easily defeated, and he uses the unique energies in his Atomic Axe to cut off gravity and fly over the trap. But Mon-El and Ultra Boy quickly meet him again and both deliver a ferocious uppercut, sending him backwards out of the battle.

Meanwhile, Tharok watches both battles on the monitor and realizes quite quickly that the tide is turning. He had calculated for at least one mishap but everything seems to be going wrong at once. Thus he decides to escalate the timetable. Using his own technology, he sends a holo-graphic beam stabbing out into space and to Mordan below. Then he makes his announcement.

“Attention Legionnaires: This is Tharok speaking for the Fatal Five! Cease your efforts on the planet Mordan at once or be prepared to pay the ultimate price! Mordan and its inhabitants shall die in three solar hours because they must. Your interference is not permitted! This world and its people have a unique elemental composition. When bathed by the nova-heat of Morgan’s dying sun they will become pure priceless energite and with a world’s worth of energite, the Fatal Five can buy a place in the galaxy.”

With the transmission over Superboy stands defiantly and vows to go after him no matter what. He blasts off into the sky and pushes himself like he has never before because the lives of a million people are on the line. He quickly reaches Tharok’s ship and even with a force that can shatter worlds, it is still not enough. Superboy ricochets back to Mordan and hits the ground unconscious. Tharok then resumes his transmission:

“There is your mightiest member, Legionnaires, your Superboy! Only he dared attack me, but even he was far too weak! For that reason, I return him to you as I warn you! These two flight rings I hold were taken from two of your absent comrades, and if you do not surrender and leave this world, your comrades die…screaming!” 

Chapter 2: 3 Hours to Holocaust

Validius, Persuader, and Mano walk defiantly toward the standing Legionnaires as Superboy regains consciousness and stands. They are defiant and vow, once again, that they will not let this planet die. And in a space, the answer is echoed. But Emerald Empress tells Sun Boy, Brainiac 5 and Element Lad that they have doomed their comrades. And she will have that energite so she can take back the throne of her home world again. But even that is answered with a blast of fire from Sun Boy. She sneers and tells Sun Boy because of that, he will die. 

Meanwhile on Mordan, Validus has stopped and is receiving orders from Tharok. Saturn Girl intercepts the message and though she does not understand it, she can hear the nefarious nature of the message. Superboy suggests to use the delay to put together a plan, but Shadow Lass blurts out that it is too late, because they have resumed their attack. And these Legionnaires are at a disadvantage because they do not know which of their comrades face certain doom. 

And as if right on cue, Tharok activates a sequence and though he knows that his actions has not changed the situation in the field of battle, he can at least enjoy watching Karate Kid and Princess Projectra die at the cold metal hands of his Guardian Robot. But there is one thing Tharok missed. Karate Kid is the greatest martial artist of the 30th Century and despite PP’s plea he takes the robot head on. The robot moves first and he just manages to dodge a deadly swinging arm, and instead delivers a mighty cop to its leg, cutting it clean off. He follows that up with a mighty kick of the other leg and disables the robot completely.

They run down the hallway to make their escape and the Princess reminds him that her powers are not so effective against steel and lifeless creatures. Suddenly they come to a massive double steel door. Karate Kid studies it and surmises that since Tharok always favors his right-side, his robot side, he will start there. And he pummels away at the door making Tharok very nervous on the other side.

We leave this moment and join our Legionnaires on the ground who continue their battle against three members of the Fatal Five. The battle rages for minutes that seem to be hours and then, in an instant, the battle stops. Persuader has boarded a ship and calls for Validus to join him. And since his simple brain knows nothing else but to obey, he quickly boards the ship and it takes off to join Tharok. Superboy tells the Legionnaires to hold because Tharok’s ship is Legonnaire-proof and their first priority is to save the world. Mon-El says maybe, but the saving of a world begins with a single life, and he takes off in space to save the three Legionnaires who are still battling Emerald Empress and her evil Eye of Ekron.

The Empress gleefully eyes her new victim and commands the Eye to attack. The Eye of Ekron obeys and delivers a powerful blast of green energy that hits Mon-El squarely in the chest and to no effect. Mon-El reminds the evil Empress that though Superboy may be weakened by the Eye’s Kryptonite-based beam, it cannot harm him. She smiles and replies that even though it may be the case, the Eye has other uses. Such as helping her to escape. And both the Emerald Empress and the Eye vanish. 

We return to Karate Kid and Princess Projectra who successfully smashed the steel door and face a shocked Tharok who cannot believe they survived his Guardsman Robot. Karate Kid replies with a double kick in Tharok’s face, spewing him on the ground. But suddenly a flash of green erupts, covering the entire room and Emerald Empress and the rest of the Fatal Five appear. Since we have already seen six Legionnaires fall before three of the Fatal Five, we need not illustrate what will happen to only two heroes. Instead, let us mercifully turn away from this scene and return to the planet Mordan. 

Brainy and Saturn Girl observe Colossal Boy who is current preparing what appears to be a sphere craft. Saturn Girl remarks that they will need to work fast if they will be able to complete the evacuation and stop the Fatal Five at the same time. Ultra Boy joins Colossal Boy and hopes that they just might make it and hopefully Brainy’s idea brought forth from his solar analysis will buy them more time. They both board the sphere, close its door, and fly it off into space to meet Tharok’s ship and hopefully rescue the two Legionnaires.

Back in Tharok’s ship, Karate Kid really wants to get his hands on Tharok. Tharok smiles and tells him it is quite impossible because he has used inertia to contain his powers (whoops, Karate Kid does not have powers but I will forgive Levitz…THIS TIME) and the Princess’ illusions as well. He then predicts that within the hour, they will beg him to die. But his joy is cut short by Emerald Empress announcing that there is an asteroid heading toward their position. Tharok screams that it is impossible, there are no asteroids in this sector of space and the ship’s shields are not programmed to repel it. And to prove that point the sphere slams into the ship and out pop Colossal Boy and Ultra Boy. Colossal Boy screams at Tharok to release the Legionnaires or there will be hell to pay. 

Instantly, the Fatal Five attack and the ship becomes filled with a maddening maelstrom of battle. Awesome energies clash with super-human strength and a ‘helpless’ hero struggles with his bonds. Karate Kid decides to use the ancient muscle flexing technique that he learned and focuses, finally breaking free. Such feats continue to prove that Karate Kid is indeed the master of all the galaxy’s myriad martial arts!

Karate Kid tells Princess Projectra to hang lose and he has a score to settle. But Karate Kid’s revenge is interrupted by Mordan’s sun finally reaching the point of nova. The vidi-screen explodes in polychromatic pandemonium and a star dies. But Tharok needs to check his equipment and ensures that Princess Projectra is still bound. Seeing that everything is working he knows that it is not an illusion. He heads to the console to activate the control when Mon-El and Superboy arrive, opening the side of the ship like a tin-can. They take advantage of the surprise and Superboy, Mon-El and Ultra Boy take down Validus while the others take care of the rest. And after the Fatal Five are securely bound they look to Brainiac Five to give them the status of the planet below. 

Brainy studies the equipment and makes one conclusion, though he hates to admit it. He has to make an educated guess and also a leap of faith and try to deactivate the solatherm bomb Tharok planted in Mordan’s sun. He presses the button and hopes for the best. 

Meanwhile Tharok, while bound with the others, carefully places his foot and activates a switch in the floor, causing the ship to self-destruct. Superboy commands everyone to evacuate the ship immediately. Seconds after they escape into the void, Tharok’s ship shatters into a million microscopic shards. Deadly fragments are kept from the Legionnaires by Brainiac Five’s Force-Shield belt, set on its widest projection, while the Legionnaires breathe the oxygen created from free-floating elements in space by Element Lad.

Moments later on Mordan, Colossal Boy loads the rest of the population onto the ark and Saturn Girl announces they better board their Cruiser now or they will face the fate the Mordanites have just escaped from. As the Legion cruiser soars into space, a nova is born and a world dies. Karate Kid remakes that the view is nice when they are not about to be killed from it. But he is still confused on why they just saw it twice. Superboy jumps in to let him in on what transpired:

“Oh, that’s right, Karate Kid, you were in Tharok’s ship when we planned it! You see Brainy’s solar analysis indicated that there was an alien substance in the star, something Tharok put there to intensify the nova reaction. But there was no way to stop it without Tharok’s controls. So Shady eclipsed the planet Mordan, and we put on a show for Tharok and faked it going nova with super-powers.

“That made him rush to his equipment and identify the console that controlled the gimmick in the star, which Briany then used to slow down the reaction and buy everyone time to complete the evacuation.”

Karate Kid is impressed but Superboy is angry. He knows the Fatal Five are not dead and they escaped them again. But he swears that they will pay for what they did to Mordan, and they will not believe the price!

Next: “The Infinite Man” Attacks from Tomorrow—Today! Be there—on July 21st!

Creative Team

I want to get this out of the way. This is an incredible issue, dare I say a perfect example of what makes the Legion of Super-Heroes so great. Also it is indeed a true giant sized issue, consisting of just one complete story with thirty-four wonderful pages. There are no reprints here or anything rushed, this is just one big epic, a depiction of why the Legion exists in the first place, that just so happens to include one of their most famous (or infamous) villains of all-time: The Fatal Five. In fact, at this point in the reading, if there is an issue I can recommend, whether the person I am talking to is a long-time fan or perhaps wanting to learn about the Legion of Super-Heroes for the first time, I would put issue #231 into their hands. Immediately.  

With that out of the way, the most important aspect to focus on, right off the bat, is the art. This is the most beautiful entry of the series. From page one when you are treated to Colossal Boy carefully putting the Mordanites in the ark, you know you are in for a treat. James Sherman and Jack Abel flex hard here. Probably what is going to pop out at you is not only the wonderfully rendered environments and action battles but the close-ups that convey emotions of either shock, horror, or surprise. Whatever the emotion, Sherman and Abel hit you hard. Also just when you thought you were getting a lot of cake you are also able to eat it. Peppered throughout are gorgeous splash-pages that portray incredible action and simply sweep you off your feet. If this is anything, it is a celebration of this book officially becoming the very first stand-alone book about this super-powered team.

Now we can move to Paul Levitz who hit the ground running and continues to not be shy about pushing this thing to the limit. He teases throughout that the Fatal Five are going to kill someone and with every page you turn you think it is going to happen. The Fatal Five, after all, have already killed a Legionnaire in this series, and if you loved Invisible Kid you were shocked when he died at the hands of Validus. So not only do the Legion have their hands full with trying to save an entire planet, but they also have to survive whatever the Fatal Five has in store for them.

When we look at Paul Levitz, he excels at placing the Legion of Super-Heroes in a very real time and place. Of course they would be involved in a mission like this, and of course an entire world and its population would be at stake. In fact, we even have our first sort of Galactic Encyclopedia entry when they describe planet Mordan, a trope that Levitz would employ throughout his run. These little tidbits of information continue to enrich the world and take it beyond simple situational events and problems that the Legion has to solve at the time. In fact, he further expands his interpretation of the characters and strives to make them feel real. I just have to point out the exchange between Shadow Lass and Saturn Girl, when Shadow Lass is shocked that Saturn Girl was not able to comprehend why the children were so scared. It was because they were alone and it was Shadow Lass that had to embrace them and calm them down. Here we get a sense that Saturn Girl might not be able to spot or identify complex feelings like these, even though she has powerful telepathic abilities and can detect complex emotions, but cannot understand them. It is things like this that is absolutely brilliant. 

In addition, we finally get a bit of an intertwinement between this main book and the spin-off series that is the Karate Kid, even if it is just a brief mention. They have been promising some sort of crossover between the two books that has yet to happen. But it was quite satisfying to see Karate Kid and Princess Projectra together and happy, knowing that they just completed a mission on Orando and have pretty much reconciled their relationship. Also I must point out that another aspect that makes Levitz run quite remarkable is that he did employ a lot of sexual innuendo and tension in the book. Which, if you think about it, makes perfect sense if you put super-powered teenagers together. Because things are going to happen and will go down. So the little interplay between KK and PP was that tiny little spark of the beginning of including themes like sex that will become more apparent as we continue. 

I do find it ironic that Levitz was quite adamant in the beginning to continue the two-story format of the book, when he is allowed to run with a full thirty-four page story that ended up being probably one of the best issues in the series. I do wonder if they will continue delivering these number of pages in the Giants or will revert back to multiple stories or perhaps instilling reprints. I hope this is not the case and I do hope that James Sherman and Jack Abel can keep up the pace and continue slamming us with these amazing depictions of our favorite teenage super-heroes of the thirtieth century. 

Legion Outpost

As stated in the leader, we have a new title for the letters page. Fare thee well Super-Talk. You have been a source of information from time to time since the beginning and we will miss you. But instead of telling you about the changes, I will simply hand it over to the editors themselves:

“Welcome to the new world of the Legion. After some nineteen years of floating around the DC world, they finally have a suitable home of their own. As of this issue, this magazine is officially, legally and permanently Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes and will be a monthly 48-page of magnificence. We’ll try and keep the quality standard high, and make this the year of the Legion.”

How about that. Also I did find it quite clever and a nice little callout that Legion Outpost was of course the very famous fanzine that was quite popular at the time. So it is nice they gave that a little nod. It finally does appear that they got all their ducks in order and I suppose this is the official launch of the book. And what a launch it was as described in the Creative Team section. This is probably the best stand-alone issue we have come across so far. 

So off to some fun stuff. First off, what about Mike Grell? Kevin McRae wrote in to say that there should not be any despair because Mike Grell will return forever and ever, just like the creative team promised. Uh hum…about that.

“We tried hard to get Mike back on LSH, but even kidnapping his wife Sandy didn’t help…as things have turned out, he hasn’t even been able to become the full-time penciller [on Batman] because Green Lantern/Green Arrow is becoming a monthly later this summer and that will occupy most of his time.

“[…]this Christmas season we’re doing a $2.00 Legion tabloid edition, and Mike will be illustrating the lion’s share of it.”

That my fellow Legionnaire fans, would be the famous Treasury Edition in all of its glory. I cannot wait to cover it. But yes, we all knew that he would not be coming back so now it is official. However, James Sherman is getting a lot of praise as well and from this issue, any doubters were laid to rest. Because he rocked it in every sense. 

Gregg Flood wrote in to ask about Dawnstar and they promised there will be more Dawnstar development in issue #233. Which, as we will see, unfortunately does not happen. The scheduling is getting a bit mixed up because they also promised The Infinite Man next issue but this also does not come to pass. We will have to bring out our magnifying glasses to figure out why, but usually when this happens this means we are in for a change.

To wrap up the Legion Outpost, they give a nice little update on the voting for the new leader. They received 30 votes and though the deadline is not yet over, they do expect to be more and will announce the winner in #234. All exciting stuff.

There is a nice little Legion Outpost extra and they use it to give short descriptions of each character to bring new readers up to speed. Which is kind of neat.

To conclude this section there is a lot to look forward to and this was very much a milestone issue for all the reasons described above. Upwards and onwards friends!

The Legion Medallion of Merit

With thirty-four pages of story, that is action packed, with every Legionnaire holding their own, it is incredibly difficult to pick one who went above and beyond the call of duty. But after a few re-reads and pouring over each panel (which wasn’t hard considering that this is probably the most beautiful book of the series), I was able to find one Legionnaire that is deserving of the Medallion of Merit. And the medallion goes too…

Sun Boy! This kid put himself in harms away and was able to protect both Brainiac Five and Element Lad when they were doing their analysis. Anytime the Emerald Empress shows up you will fear for your life, I do not care how brave you are. She has killed and will kill again. So the fact that Sun Boy attacked and managed to keep her busy was really putting his life on the line and going above and beyond for his teammates and not to mention for a whole planet. 

Congratulations Sun Boy! You showed immense courage and literally took a big blast of emerald energy right in the back for the team. If anyone is deserving of this medallion it is you. Hold it up high and may everyone be reminded in the role you played in saving a population of one million people.

And we made it through this giant-sized write-up my fellow fans of the Legion of Super-Heroes. To quote Paul Levitz and Denny O’Neil, the best is yet to come and always remember…

LONG LIVE THE LEGION!