058 Legionnaires Book One

When this run of Legion of Super-Heroes first started, I wasn't really having it.  Sure, I read every issue, but I just wasn't happy with it.  The Legion of Super-Heroes had two series going.  The main book featured the Legion and the second book, Legionnaires, featured younger clones of the original team.  Then DC decided "fuck it, let's start over."  And both books were rebooted and we started over at day one again.  We got new adventures, new motivations, new characters.  I wasn't happy because my team, a team I'd been reading since I was ten or eleven years old, was suddenly gone.  They were replaced with these imposters.

But over time, this title really grew on me.  It wasn't bad.  It wasn't done half-assed like another reboot I've complained about a lot on this blog.  And the characters slowly became old friends again.  There were new characters whom I adored (XS!!!  Monstress!!!!).  There were reboots I didn't particularly care for (Projectra.... um, no.)

What's weird re-reading these stories, especially in this format, is seeing how quickly the basis of the Legion was thrown together.  This volume reprints six or seven issues of each series and it's crazy how quickly they added and subtracted members in less than the first year of the series.  Sure, it kind of makes sense they way they did it, but it was still pretty quick how many characters were introduced after the team was formed.

It's weird to me that Mark Waid was behind the reboot of the team into this AND the reboot of this team into the next iteration.  This one worked.  The one after this so did not.  I'm anxious to see the next volume of this book.

Legionnaires Book One

Writer: Tom McCraw, Tom Peyer, Mark Waid

Artist: Stuart Immonen, Lee Moder, Jeffrey Moy, Brian Apthorp, Scott Benefiel, Yancey Labat, Chris Renaud, Ron Boyd, W.C. Carani, Philip Moy, Tom Simmons

DC Comics

044 Supergirl Book 2

And here's where the problem for me begins.  I've been a lifelong fan of Supergirl.  I've been with her through thick and thin, so even a Peter David written Supergirl wasn't going to keep me away.  I'm just not a big fan of David's "look at how fucking clever I am" writing style.  It's grating.  It's annoying.  He's not a terrible plotter, but his scripting, to me, is awful.

The first volume of this series was actually kind of refreshing to me considering the writer.  Peter David was given Supergirl and like every writer who has come along since Crisis on Infinite Earths, he set up the series to try to bring Supergirl back to her pre-Crisis status quo, or at least as close to it as allowable.  He took the then current Supergirl (aka Matrix) and melded her with earth girl Linda Danvers.  Suddenly, for the first time since Crisis, we have Linda Danvers aka Supergirl.  The first volume wasn't bad.

Now we come to volume two, where Peter David really starts to drive home the religious through lines.  Linda's mother is all God-Squad.  There's a boy running around who looks like the 7th Doctor but who is God.  Linda becomes an Earth Angel.  This is where he really starts to lose me.  I don't think this angle works.  I find myself rolling my eyes more and more with each page I read.

But it's Supergirl and I love Supergirl.

Supergirl Book 2

Writer: Peter David, Darren Vincenzo, Tom Peyer, Chuck Dixon

Artist: Leonard Kirk, Greg Land, Anthony Castrillo, Cam Smith, Prentis Rollins, Chuck Drost, Doug Hazlewood, Jordi Ensign

DC Comics