Legion of Super-Heroes Re-Read – The Secret Origin of Bouncing Boy͟ (Adventure Comics #301 – October, 1962)

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It’s recruitment time again for the Legion—which, we’re told, is a once-a-year day. Pretty funny, then, that in the four years since they first appeared, we’ve seen them recruit Superboy, Supergirl, Brainiac 5, Mon-El, Bouncing Boy, Sun Boy, Star Boy, Shrinking Violet and Ultra Boy—nine members, and mostly male, so the one-time one boy/one girl rule doesn’t explain it away. Plus we’re told it’s been some years since Bouncing Boy joined. Once again, the “one per year” rule defies belief if the kids are all supposed to be under 18.

So We’ve seen many recruitment days already, but this is the first time we see what would become a Legion tradition—the rejects. So far, all the applicants we’ve seen have eventually made the cut. Here we start to see the likes of Lester Spiffany, whose super-power is that he’s rich (hey, it works for Batman!) and Storm Boy. These unworthies are soundly dismissed by the Legion: “It hasn’t been nice meeting you!” Cosmic Boy tells Lester. “We don’t want your ilk in our club!” the Triplicate Girls tell Storm Boy as they manhandle him away from the clubhouse.

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Legion of Super-Heroes Re-Read – “The League of Fantastic Supermen!” (Superman’s Pal Jimmy Olsen #63, September, 1962)

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Another “not Legion” story appears in a “not Superboy / Supergirl” story. Jimmy Olsen had his own title throughout the 1960s, as did Lois Lane, making them certainly the first—possibly still the only—non-costumed, non-super supporting characters to rate their own titles. (To be fair, both Jimmy and Lois took on costumed identities fairly often in these stories, including Jimmy’s assumption of the identity of Elastic Lad, a reserve member of the Legion of Super-Heroes, down the road.)

Of course, Superman, Supergirl and the whole Superman Family showed up in every issue. Indeed, in 1974, Superman’s Pal Jimmy Olsen was re-titled Superman Family, and Lois and Supergirl’s titles were canceled so they could be rolled into it. Jimmy’s book was also, strangely enough, Jack Kirby’s first assignment upon arriving at DC Comics, and thus is the title in which the Fourth World was launched.

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Legion Re-Read – The Story of the Legion Thus Far…

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Since I’ve reached the premiere of their own series, I feel it’s time to take a break and look at the events and appearance that led up to that premiere–to present a Legion Timeline for the four and a half years (almost) between their first appearance and their final arrival as their own property.

In that time, sixteen new heroes were introduced (counting Comet, the Super-Horse), plus a whole other team of arch villains, and a groundwork was laid for a team with rules and a recruitment policy–something few super teams had or have to this day. And, of course, they were all teenagers. We had had the Boy Commandoes and the Newsboy Legion, and Little Boy Blue and the Blue Boys, but not a whole Legion of teens who ran their own affairs.

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Legion of Super-Heroes Re-Read – “Face Behind the Lead Mask!” (Adventure Comics #300, September, 1962)

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This is the beginning. This is the day. After four years as guest-stars in other strips, the Legion of Super-Heroes begin their own regular series in Adventure Comics. This tri-centennial issue proudly proclaims on its cover, “Featuring Superboy in ‘Tales of the Legion of Super-Heroes!'” Of course, there is only one such tale in this issue, and it’s the second feature. Ah well…

It doesn’t begin well: “Inside this Metropolis clubhouse, in the 21st Century…” Sigh… Jerry and Mort, once again couldn’t keep track of what time period these kids lived in. Or maybe they just didn’t care. Or maybe they were deliberately screwing with readers, just to see if anyone noticed. At any rate, this is the first Legion story that begins with the Legion, and in the 20th Century with Superman or Supergirl. Although, just as in Superboy and Supergirl stories, our first glimpse of the Legionnaires is of statues of them, not of the actual people. But the “Hall of Heroes” shows us, for the first time, that Shrinking Violet is now a member. She hasn’t been seen or mentioned since her first appearance as a candidate. Nor, ironically, does she appear in this story.

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Legion of Super-Heroes Re-Read – “The Boy With the Ultra-Powers!” (Superboy #98, July, 1962)

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Jerry Siegel and Curt Swan create another new Legionnaire, like Mon-El, not billed as such at the outset, and, like Mon-El, slated to be one of the power-houses of the Legion. In this issue, however, he has only the power of “Pentetra-Vision,” a power broader in scope than Superboy’s X-Ray vision. Eventually, he would be shown to have all of Superboy’s powers, but only to be able to use one of them at a time. (Ironically, Star Boy, in his first appearance, had all of Superboy’s powers as well. He would trade those for a single power. As of this issue, however, Star Boy had not appeared again.)

Ultra Boy comes to Smallville with his elder friend, Marla. They wear the same red and green “action costumes” (why Marla wears a version of Ultra Boy’s costume is never explained) and report via a “cosmic scope” to a secret headquarters. Their mission: to find Superboy so that Ultra Boy can discover his secret identity. Marla reminds Ultra Boy that he’s in trouble if he fails in his mission. Oooh, these guys seem like bad news!

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Legion of Super-Heroes Re-Read – “Superman’s Super-Courtship” (Action Comics #289 – June, 1962)

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We begin with Linda Danvers crying over a sad movie with her parents. The power goes out, and she swiftly changes to Supergirl and rushes to repair a broken, underground cable. What the union for the local power company thinks of the resultant lost overtime is not mentioned, but people are thrilled that Supergirl can handle high voltage lines without being harmed. For her part, Linda is thinking only about how sad it is that the hero in the movie lost the love of his life by waiting too long to propose.

She decides that her cousin Superman is in danger of being along forever, because he won’t propose to either Lois Lane or Lana Lang. Despite her parents’ objections, Linda decides to play Cupid. She first attempts to set Superman up with Helen of Troy, oblivious to the fact that, if Helen is real, then she was a big part of history, and marrying Superman would change that history. And, indeed, though Superman doesn’t take the bait, Supergirl herself nearly takes Helen’s place in history.

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Legion of Super-Heroes Re-Read – “Supergirl’s Greatest Challenge” (Action Comics #287, April, 1962)

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At DC, Silver Age comic stories tended to be laid out differently than modern comics, in that the splash page was not a page of the story, but a representative piece of artwork and a text box that summarized what was about to happen, like jacket copy on a book. Marvel abandoned this style immediately—in the first issue of The Fantastic Four—but DC continued it up into the 1970s. The first Legion story to omit this representative splash was (I believe) in Superboy Starring the Legion of Super-Heroes #220. Part of the reason for this sort of “internal cover” was that not every story was represented on the cover, back in the days where a standard comic book contained two or three stories. Did anyone read the” jacket copy?” Good question. But it was there. Continue reading →

Legion of Super-Heroes Re-Read – “The Legion of Super-Traitors” (Adventure Comics #293, February, 1962)

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Seven months out from the premiere of its own series, the Legion adds yet another associate legion to their mythos. The last one was villainous. This one isn’t even human. (Okay, eventually the Legion wouldn’t be all human either, but those days are far off! Begs the question, though, why couldn’t the super-animals just be regular Legionnaires? You may laugh, but I have had three colleagues, dogs, who were considered members of the Fire Department.)

Jerry Siegel co-creates the Super-Pets, appropriately with primo Super-artist Curt Swan, drawing the teen Legionnaires for the first time. (His first Legion story was “The Legion of Super-Villains,” in which they were adults.)

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Legion of Super-Heroes Re-Read – “The Secret of the Seventh Super-Hero!” (Adventure Comics #290, November, 1961)

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At the outset of this story, the reader might be fooled into thinking, “Finally! A Legion story with full participation by seven members!” The splash page, after all, shows Phantom Girl, Chameleon Boy, Brainiac 5 and the three founders all flying into action to hide pieces of a dread weapon.

But it’s not to be. This is a Sun Boy solo story—and really not even that—in which the other Legionnaires make only cameos. They hid the weapon pieces a while back. It all begins with Tom Tanner, Clark Kent’s unknown doppelganger, escaping from reform school and hopping a train to freedom. “Freedom,” in this case, is Smallville, where he learns that he looks exactly like somebody named Clark Kent, whom everyone likes. Apparently, they like him so much that they don’t feel comfortable asking, “Clark, why are you wearing an orange suit like a prisoner would wear?” Hey, maybe they thought it was one of those crazy new fashion trends the kids were into those days.

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Legion of Super-Heroes Re-Read – “The Legion of Super-Villains!” (Superman #147, August, 1961)

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As promised at the end of “The Army of Living Kryptonite Men”, an adult Lex Luthor, imprisoned, makes good on his promise to track down the Legion of Super-Villains, which must exist, he reasons, if there is a Legion of Super-Heroes. His method of tracking them down is pretty hilarious—he offers to repair all of his fellow inmates’ broken radios, and, while doing so, steals one part from each of them in order to build a future transmitter. Did the radios with missing parts actually work when he was done? We’re never told. I guess it doesn’t matter, since, after building the future transmitter, he quickly secures the means to escape.

“Calling the future!” he says into his transmitter. (I love it!) These were the days, if you don’t remember them, when a lot of Americans still didn’t dial phones. They picked them up and told an operator who they wanted to talk to. So Lex wasn’t behaving that out of character for someone of his time, but still… The whole future, Lex? All of it?

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