Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes (1977) #243

Paul Levitz (script)

Joe Staton (pencils)

Jack Abel (inks)

Cory Adams (colors)

Jean Simek (letters)

Al Milgrom (editor)

It’s one issue-long story this time, no backup, which is both good and bad. It’s bad because this issue’s a letdown from the previous two “Earthwar!” entries, but it’s good because after an issue of Joe Staton penciling instead of James Sherman… It’s okay if the issue is over.

Writer Paul Levitz carries on as though nothing’s changed with the penciller replacement. Except Levitz’s exposition plays very differently against Staton and inker Jack Abel’s bland future scenery. It’s not just bland compared to the previous issue; it’s bland for any Legion. Staton and Abel are working fast, and it’s impressive how much they get done; completion, not excellence, is their goal.

The wind’s out of the sails immediately, with Levitz opening with that female Science cop Wildfire almost killed a couple issues ago. She gets a name this time—Shvaughn Erin—and quite a bit of expository reflection to catch readers up. We get to see Staton and Abel’s take on moody close-ups. Not promising. We also finally find out why she was on an urgent mission to see the Legion at the start of this story arc–one of their greatest foes has escaped captivity. She’s fairly sure the escape will have something to do with the resolution of this big storyline. So much so, she knows not to think the name of the great foe; be too soon to reveal.

The story then jumps to Weber’s World, the artificial planet of intergalactic peace, as aliens arrive for the long-promised peace negotiations. Not good space alien art. Lots of dialogue for them, and weak art to go along with it. It’s rough times, though Staton and Abel do better with the action scenes than the talking heads. And there’s some action in this part. It’s chase action, which is probably the best kind for the artists. Because their space-war action art won’t really click, nor will their future ground-war action art. They get it all done, though. They do accomplish their task.

Superboy and the guys who didn’t do that genocide–which they totally could have done, too, they’re tough guys–last issue on Khund arrive on Weber’s World just after the latest assassination attempt, and because the negotiating aliens (the Dominators, who are supposedly peace-loving) only trust the Legion, Earth negotiators are on their own.

Levitz cuts from the protagonists of parts one and two and does this summary bit over the war on Earth. It’s all about the valiant Legionnaires who are still around, making their last stand. There’s a bit about their deeply held value of not killing sentient beings, which is an odd inclusion unless someone read the last issue and thought they should remind some of the boys. The “sentient” bit lands odd, of course. Presumably, the multiple telepaths have cleared all their meats.

Anyway.

This section of the issue gets tedious fast. It’s cameo and guest star time, but it’s not exciting. The book’s not visually engaging. Sometimes, quite the opposite. And it gets more and more tedious as it goes on. No matter what Levitz has in store, Staton and Abel don’t make it look interesting. By the time the comic gets to the conclusion—after a nothing-burger reveal of the “Earthwar!” masterminds as an old Legion nemesis (with no editor’s note or context from Levitz for unfamiliar readers, which is a choice of its own)–the art’s operating on fumes, looking more like a proposal than finished work.

The issue’s a race for both Levitz—whose pacing for this story is completely different than the previous two entries—and the artists. They both make it, the artists worse for wear, and Levitz has exhausted his repertoire of narrative devices. He tries everything, and Staton can’t make hash out of any of it.

For part three in this arc, it’s a major letdown and entirely obvious why it’s happened. It is an exemplar team superhero comic narrative, again, only for the endurance, this time, not for the quality.

Maybe Sherman’s back next time. And if not, hopefully Levitz figures out how to adjust to Sherman’s absence for the finale.

Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes (1977) #242

Paul Levitz (script)

James Sherman (pencils)

Bob McLeod (inks)

Cory Adams (colors)

Ben Oda (letters)

Al Milgrom (editor)

Once again, the feature story opens with Wildfire being a jerk. Last issue, he was going to let a Science Police officer die because her spaceship wasn’t well-maintained, and this issue, he’s going off on a fascist rant. At least it’s less life-threatening this time. It’d also be less striking if his girlfriend, Dawnstar, didn’t demand absolute loyalty to the Legion leader from her teammates. There’s a definite fash vibe to the story, which just increases later, with even Superboy lashing out.

Wildfire and Dawnstar are on the Weber’s World team, Superboy’s on the Earth defense team. The former’s supposed to be protecting a galactic peace summit, but the other power hasn’t arrived, and there are already terror attacks against the good guy negotiators. A confounding, frustrating situation, so it’s good the other heroes on the mission—Ultra Boy and Mon-El—frequently ignore Wildfire’s directions and, in fact, do save people’s lives. While writer Paul Levitz will focus on the Earth-bound story arc, the Weber’s World story has a lot of kick to it. Partially because of the intergalactic intrigue stuff, partially because it gives penciller James Sherman a chance to draw a future city planet, and it’s gorgeous.

Sherman, ably inked by Bob McLeod, turns in a sumptuous piece of work here. Every element—faces, figures, backgrounds—invites intentional inspection. Especially the facial expressions; Sherman’s got these big expressive eyes and intense detail. And those expressions get dark, too. Devastated at the loss of life during space-based warfare Superboy is one thing, but potentially genocidal Superboy is a whole other. Sherman and McLeod make both happen.

Great art. If there’s better future space teen superhero art, I can’t wait to see it someday.

Anyway.

Back on Earth, it’s not the other power from the negotiations attacking (those are the Dominators), but rather the Khunds. The Khunds appear to be a human colony gone nasty, and they’ve launched a drone ship attack on Earth. Earth’s not ready for it. Wildfire’s not there to say it’s because the Science Police are bad at their job, but it sure seems like they could be better prepared (more on Science Police preparations in the backup, it turns out).

Brainiac 5 pisses everyone off, telling them there’s no way to win the battle for Earth. They need to retreat and regroup. Deputy leader Element Lad isn’t listening to any of that quitter talk, so he ships Brainy off to Weber’s World (with no presence in the rest of this issue) and forms a strike force to go take out the leader of the Khunds. The team consists of Element Lad, Colossal Boy, Sun Boy, and Superboy. They’re going to the capital city, populated mostly by civilians.

Element Lad’s going to take it to eleven and threaten painful murder, while Superboy’s not going to promote truth, justice, and that stuff.

All that anger gives way to Levitz revealing—or at least establishing—the villains, and setting up for next issue.

It’s excellent comics.

Then there’s the backup, which does indeed involve the Science Police (more, actually, since they don’t have any character-level presence in the feature). The Legion’s “prettiest” members are out for a night on the town when some criminals hijack the levitating restaurant. The Science Police are having their annual award dinner and are the perfect target. As long as the criminals have the brass held hostage, the rank and file won’t stop them from looting all the fancy shops of future Metropolis.

It’s a sizable, fourteen-page backup from writer Paul Kupperberg (with a Levitz plot), penciller Arvell Jones, and inker Danny Bulandi. The Legionnaire team is Dream Girl, Shadow Lass, Princess Projectra, and Light Lass. They immediately take on the criminals, only to discover the hostage part of the equation, and are captured.

Except they’re not, because Princess Projectra has projecting-hallucination powers, and so does maybe Dream Girl? It’s the traditional Legionnaires’ powers equation with a distinctive setting. They’re in the “civilian” future city, and while Jones doesn’t go for Sherman’s detail, he does lean into the scenery. The art’s got a lot of personality.

The story has the Legionnaires splitting up to stop various heists, which are very similar to those in the modern day, and each learning a clue to unlock the third act. It’s straightforward, solid superhero stuff, not superlative like the feature, but a nice, sturdy way to round out the issue.

Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes (1977) #241

The opening story, Prologue to Earthwar, is an all-time Legion banger, despite a bit of weaponized misogyny and classism. And Wildfire being okay with manslaughter on his conscience. Oh, and weird racism against the bad guys. They’re green and slimy, so the Legionnaires call them slime-related slurs. Is it speciesism?

Finally, lots of it is definitely fascism. Fascism is okay as long as you were right in the end, says Brainiac 5 with the most disconcerting grin. Penciller James Sherman has these big, expressive eyes on these careful faces, and so when every hero is grinning in their action panel, it feels like a victory lap of a comic book. But it’s unclear for what, because writer Paul Levitz doesn’t just punt the reveal into the next issue; he punts two reveals into the next issue. Probably not three, but possibly three.

It’s a wild story and wildly successful. The political and military business comes in rapid fire, but never with too much exposition. The story is mostly an action story. Superboy shows up and kicks ass; the Legion zooms out on a mission against the green space pirates in an extended sequence, which includes those sexism and classism subplots. Plot points. Plot details. Whatever they are.

With Sherman’s pencils (ably inked by Bob McLeod), Levitz basically has primetime TV teenagers as the Legion to play with. They’re able to do a bunch of character work, like Levitz is flexing because he knows he’s got Sherman doing the art. So, again, it has that victory lap feeling, like the creators know what they’ve got going here, they know how well it’s going to land, so they’re enjoying the stroll.

That attitude is infectious–the story’s fun. Superheroes show up and do really well-rendered superhero action things. They’re usually not being creepy to the girls. They’re often not being crappy about how other carbon-based life forms look. And there’s time for missions and side missions. Levitz has a full twenty-two pages, and Sherman only takes one of them for a big splash page. Sherman draws this book as if he wants to read it; Levitz writes it as if he wants to see Sherman draw it. The synergy’s out of sight.

The buildup towards the finish, where Levitz recalls various details from the story to that point, letting the reader in on some of the connections, is fantastic. Great cliffhangers. Just an outstanding Legion comic book.

There are the bad vibes, of course–the fascism, racism, sexism. Again, as long as you never get caught being wrong, you’re doing the right thing. I also just realized Superboy is never around for Brainiac 5 manipulating his teammates.

Still, great comic.

The backup has Paul Kupperberg writing a Timber Wolf extended backup (it’s 12 pages, meaning we get a full-page retelling of Light Lass’s origin). They’re on mission together, but the planet police guy doesn’t want Light Lass on the case because it’s about her evil brother, Lightning Lord.

Kupperberg’s scripting from a Levitz plot, with Arvell Jones and Danny Bulanadi on art. Jones likes doing some seventies fight scenes. The attitude and particulars remind a lot of Wolverine (oh, and Timber Wolf’s hair). But Kupperberg’s got a bunch of exposition to get out, like they were supposed to have more pages, not less.

It’s okay. It’s kind of roughly done; Kupperberg’s most engaged when it’s Timber Wolf interrogating the locals and playing rogue superhero. Then, most of the story ends up being Lightning Lord’s whinging.

But it doesn’t need to be on par with Prologue, just smooth enough to get through. And it does.

Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes (1978) #235

Paul Levitz (1), Gerry Conway (2) (script)

Mike Grell (1), George Tuska (2) (pencils)

Vince Colletta (inks)

Jerry Serpe (colors)

Milt Snapinn (1), Ben Oda (2) (letters)

Al Milgrom (editor)

Joe Orlando (managing editor)

Hang on, it’s Vince Colletta inking both stories? I knew he was on the strange backup from Gerry Conway and George Tuska (Tuska on Legion is fun). But Colletta also inks Grell on the feature. And I think it’s been my favorite Grell art on Superboy… probably ever? So, sometimes, stars align.

While it’s still not great art, and lots of the costume designs seem to be geared towards silliness over function, Grell takes advantage of the story to really showcase Superboy, which doesn’t happen often. The opportunity arises here because of the plot—the Legion is doing their annual brainwashing of the Boy of Steel when an alert comes in, and because Brainiac 5 doesn’t know how to keep circuits separate, the brainwashing gets interrupted. They have to go save a research station with Superboy, who is susceptible to dangerous future information because of that interruption.

The research station is the most important in the Federation, called “Life Sciences,” and all the scientists are very surprised Superboy has never heard of it. Writer Paul Levitz will pepper the story with Superboy’s suspicions based on (literal) intergalactic eavesdropping and good old twentieth-century critical thinking, but there’s not a mystery here. The reveal isn’t anything the reader could’ve really guessed (other than Superboy’s guess being suspiciously insipid). And the way Levitz writes around the reveal—potentially the most fascinating insight into the (at best) sociopathic Legion of Super-Heroes ever—needs a reread just to parse all the connotations. It retcons almost the entire series, but everyone’s blasé about it.

Despite all the accouterments—and not just the subplot about revolutionaries who want the Federation’s secrets (the ones Superboy also can’t know)—it’s got a very Silver Age vibe, just in terms of character development. Grell’s pencils don’t clash with that vibe, either. Maybe his ability to tell these Silver Age-y stories with Bronze Age futuristics is what Grell brings to Legion.

Contrasting the feature’s Silver Age story in Bronze Age fashion is the backup, which has Conway doing a complicated flashback-based trial story. The Legion’s in trouble for not helping some politician’s son. Both the politician and the Legion needed to get the magic blood of an alien beast; it brings you back from the… You know, I was going to contrast the backup with the Tuska pencils as the more “Bronze Age,” but no, these are both really very Silver Age-y takes. Conway brings a bit more confusion to it, which gives Tuska a lot of fodder, but the core story’s Silvery.

And it’s awesome to see Tuska do the Bronze Age costume designs for some of the Legion. The flashback stuff with the monster isn’t great—not bad, just not great—but the eventual Legion theatrics are a lot of fun, visually.

The issue’s got a big reveal in the feature and the protracted setup in the backup, but neither requires any Legion foreknowledge. Just general awareness. It’s a great onboarding issue, though maybe not the best art the book’s ever had or the best writing, but if readers are into the modern (and retro) takes, this issue’ll let them know Legion’s for them.

Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes (1977) #231

Paul Levitz (script)

James Sherman (1), Michael Netzer (2) (pencils)

Jack Abel (inks)

Elizabeth Safian (colors)

Ben Oda (letters)

Joe Orlando (editor)

The Legion of Super-Heroes had cover title billing with Superboy for over thirty issues before this issue. It’s one officially titled Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes in the indicia. Even more—literally—they’re going up to fifty-two pages an issue. To celebrate, writer Paul Levitz, pencillers James Sherman and Michael Netzer (each handling one of the two chapters), and inker Jack Abel deliver an almost perfect space superhero epic. It holds until the very last panel, when Superboy is concerningly malevolent.

Superboy’s mad because the issue’s supervillains—the Legion’s nemesis team, the Fatal Five—have escaped death. During their escape, the Fatal Five tried to blow up the Legion, but failed. So Superboy’s grandstanding about how he’s going to make them pay in their next appearance. It just does not play.

And Levitz’s intentional in this move; earlier in the issue he characterizes Superboy’s attack on the Five’s spaceship focusing on how Superboy’s righteous anger fuels his extreme power. It both does and doesn’t stand out in the moment; Levitz is just saving up headliner Superboy for big moments (this attack is his first foray into the conflict), so it comes with a punch. But it’s also a bit of a strange vibe.

In that earlier scene, Superboy is super mad because the Five are taking advantage of a planet about to explode. According to the narration, he’s thinking about Krypton and the tragedy. It’s emotionally too much for the Boy of Steel. The Legion is on the planet, evacuating all the people, but time is running out. The psychic on the psychic planet (Levitz skates over this absurdity real fast, but there are telepaths in Legion, so sure, why not) saw the star go supernova too late.

It’s a strange spotlight, like Levitz was assuring someone, even though Legion was officially in the title, Superboy would still get featured special.

But once he’s got that first solo attempt out of his system, Superboy mostly syncs with the rest of the team. Levitz delights in his purple exposition with lots of second-person call-outs and thoughtful echoes in the prose. It never gets tedious; he and editor Joe Orlando always seem to know when the narration’s gone far enough and it’s time to focus on the art.

Because even though this issue’s a giant-sized epic featuring five distinct narratives (the evacuation, examining the star, kidnapped Legionnaires, the rescue team, and the leader of the Fatal Five’s plotting), it’s a visual delight. Sherman pencils the first half, opening on two Legionnaires happening across the Five and getting captured, then cutting to the planet-wide evacuation. Great visuals, with varied panels showing off the scale of the evacuation and the rush of the Legion’s work. But where Sherman really gets to flex is Brainiac-5 and friends’ science mission to the planet’s doomed sun; the Emerald Empress with her Emerald Eye attacks them. Thanks to Sherman and Abel—and Levitz, who doesn’t go overboard with the green theme—it’s a dangerous, thrilling fight. Empress thinks she can handle the good guys since Superboy’s not with them (she’s hot for Superboy; sadly, they never get any interaction).

The good guys have to use their specific powers in tandem to counter her successfully. Levitz loves writing about how the powers work. So he lines up action scenes so he can explain the recipe for the superpower combinations.

All with that great art. Space superheroes comics doesn’t get better.

The issue cuts back to the planet for another big action sequence, involving three of the Fatal Five and a growing number of Legionnaires who just can’t quite get an upper hand. Superboy isn’t there to help because he’s about to launch that attack on the spaceship and fail, which concludes the first chapter.

A handful of Legionnaires get a little more than the others, mostly just in dialogue, though sometimes starting a lengthy scene by themselves. It’s a small planet when you can fly, so no one’s by themselves too long.

The second half, featuring Netzer art—while not as strong as Sherman’s, is still excellent (and Netzer gets to do a fantastic, “this should be a poster” full-pager)–has the Legion figuring out the Five’s plan and how to defeat them. The reader doesn’t get all of the information on the latter, because there needs to be some surprise.

Right up until Superboy starts humming a murder ballad, it’s smooth sailing. Levitz’s reveals all drop at the right time, Netzer’s good at conveying the variety of actions (including, of course, Legionnaires with different powers fighting bad guys who have their own different powers). Even something simple like a fight between two giant-sized individuals (good guy Colossal Boy and bad guy Validus) gets complicated with all the regular-sized flying superheroes and villains weaving in and out.

It’s a stellar comic, with Levitz’s enthusiasm in the exposition carrying over the sillier future elements, and then the art starting at a high level and only getting better throughout.

Announcing The Comix Section, a Stop Button zine

Today, a full month later than I’d hoped but a couple weeks before I feared, I’m dropping The Comix Section #1, an e-zine of comic book criticism. If you have a good color printer, lots of ink, legal-sized paper, and a powerful stapler, it can also be a paper zine. It was meant to be a paper zine and flipped when read, with one side containing a readthrough of the DC Comics Will Eisner’s The Spirit Archives and the other a wide variety of floppies starting in the mid-1970s.

There’s a story to the variety, but I’m approximately twenty-four hours behind when I actually thought I’d be making this post, and even last night, I didn’t have it in me.

I don’t even have a full listing of the contents in me at this point, but you can see the table of contents below.

There are a bevy of download versions, which took up much of the additional prep time and is hopefully something I can automate next time.

The issue is available as a PDF or a CBZ, both full quality–oh, forgot: The Comix Section is fully “illustrated” (photos of the issues and, more significantly, the Spirit)–and compressed. The compressed should be fine. Again, lots of versions if it’s not. Or you want to try printing it out.

Download PDF 142.6 MB

Download CBZ 142.6 MB

Download CBZ (full quality) 438.3 MB

Thirty-one Spirit stories reviewed, a full-page from each of them. Eighteen DC seventies books (maybe eighteen; I actually won’t get this posted if I stop and count): Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes and All-Star Comics Starring the Justice Society of America Featuring the Super Squad. Spoiler: the first year, Spirit is better, but even with the frequent, complicated, but unequivocal yikes of Ebony in Spirit, it’s often less creepy than the DC stuff.

I’ve got a fancy dedication planned for some point (at this rate, the project will take eleven years). Lanark took thirty, but it was fiction, so I feel like I’m solid. But for now, I want to shout out Vernon (who’s reading this) and Katie (who isn’t but will read the collected CS someday, all 500k words of it–again, extrapolating from this single issue). Invaluable assistance through the process, with Vernon actually making it possible. My thanks.

I hope you’ll check it out, though if you’re here for the movies or TV, I don’t think it’ll be for you unless you’re intellectually curious about comic books. Even if you’re into comics—well, the Venn diagram of Will Eisner and Jim Shooter—honestly, comics is the only reality where they can overlap so much.

Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes (1977) #258

Superboy the Legion of Super Heroes 258

Is Legion supposed to be camp? I’m not sure what else makes sense, given writer Gerry Conway’s actually quite good plot and his reliably insipid exposition. Quite good plotting after tricking me in the opening—I thought the splash page said the issue was jumping away from R.J. Brande’s bankruptcy plot, but I just hadn’t reread the exposition enough to understand what Conway was saying.

The Legion has finally met up with Brande, and finally discovered who took his fortune. Then these rogue science police officers attack them, and we get a reasonably good “Legionnaire’s powers are perfect for this situation” action sequence before cutting away to Brainiac 5’s prison island.

Brainiac 5 is not in this issue. Not unless he turns out to have stayed evil and just gotten worse because now the comic’s about a mystery villain. The cover says his name is “The Psycho-Warrior,” but one of the Legionnaires refers to him that way. It’s not his villain name. I mean, it’ll be his villain name, but it doesn’t make any sense. I’m not sure there’s anyone worse at naming villains than late seventies, early eighties Gerry Conway. It’s like he saved all the okay ones for Firestorm and everything else is like… “Psycho-Warrior.”

Conway toggles between the stories, the Legion and the missing fortune, and Psycho-Warrior breaking out of his and Brainy’s prison. Is he Brainy? Probably not; it’s too obviously logical and can’t be drug out.

Because there’s barely a confrontation between the heroes and this new villain (who already hates the Legion, making him just like all their other villains, who hate them for being shitty white kids). He does his escape thing; they go to the Federation Council to have a showdown.

The showdown’s bad but a good idea. If Conway had built to it over a few issues instead of just having a reason for the twist… might’ve been good.

There’s a good narrative device setting up the cliffhanger and then some otherwise lousy writing.

Maybe slightly better than usual art from Joe Staton and Dave Hunt.

This issue’s the last Superboy and the Legion. I wonder if dropping the Boy of Steel’s going to help Conway at all.

Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes (1977) #257

Superboy the Legion of Super Heroes 257

If it weren’t for the backup, which pairs writer Gerry Conway with Steve Ditko (penciling, with Dan Adkins inking), this issue would give the impression Conway doesn’t like the Legion. Or, if he does, he thinks their positive traits are being smug asswipes.

In addition to the charming, sexy (really) backup story about Bouncing Boy and Duo Damsel’s misadventures trying to be regular people colonists, Conway writes the feature. Joe Staton and Dave Hunt are on the art. Maybe if the story weren’t so lackluster, something about their lackluster art would’ve stood out more (I mean, there are some weird Cosmic Boy panels thanks to that outfit, but otherwise).

The feature story is all about how important it is to lie.

The Legion is in trouble with the science police for hijacking the amusement park hovering over the Grand Canyon last issue. They needed to holographic something something to make Brainiac 5 sane again. Except now, no one knows if it works, so they’re just supposed to trust Brainy as the cops and the amusement park owner yell at them.

The issue basically takes place over fifteen minutes, with the morale of the story—for Superboy, no less—being sometimes it’s better to lie to escape accountability. Did the Superboy from Superboy and the Legion go on to be the bad guy in Final Crisis or whatever? It would make sense. They’re all a bunch of assholes.

The subplot involves the rich guy who funds them being out of money—for like the sixth straight issue—but now the Legion knows about it, so Chameleon Boy’s going to get it resolved. At least there’s some momentum on that story, though it’s also a little obnoxious. Especially since it turns out the Legion does have most of their base left, just not the ostentatious part.

This book’s a trip.

The backup’s wonderful, though. Bouncing Boy and Duo Damsel are a cute couple; Ditko’s layouts and Conway’s script have a lovely retro but not condescending thing going on.

I wish they’d take over the feature slot.

Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes (1977) #256

Superboy the Legion of Super Heroes 256

It’s one of those Legion of Super-Heroes issues where they’re asshole teenagers (actually much older people pretending to be teenagers to deceive their time-traveling friend Superboy), and it seems more like the Legion of Super-Delinquents.

This issue, they assault some theme park owner and terrorize innocent people out of the place so they can create a trip through Brainiac 5’s memories. He’s still “insane,” and they’re desperate to cure him. That cure involves one person programming his trip down memory lane while someone else reads his mind to figure out how to manipulate his feelings. When they do find a traumatic event, they change it instead of contextualizing it.

Oops, spoilers. Whatever. They want to brainwash their friend better. Is the Legion a cult?

Anyway.

While one team is trying to cure Brainy, Superboy and Cosmic Boy are destroying space police cruisers. Good thing they’re experts at saving falling ships since now they’re the ones causing the falling. Since I’ve started reading this book, I don’t think the Legion has ever been wrong. I also don’t think the government squares have ever acknowledged their infinite wisdom. Why wouldn’t they tell the government what they needed for Brainy?

Why ask when you can take, I guess? They’re not not little fascists.

And sometimes they’re scantily clad. I’m pretty sure you can find whatever nudie magazine was in the DC offices based on one of the girls, but Cosmic Boy’s got lots of lewd shots in this issue.

Gerry Conway’s still writing. He’s got a few good pages, mostly not. He drops the names too much in conversation, presumably for new readers. Given the arc is a sequel to an arc, which was a sequel to another arc, accessibility is not the series’s strong point.

No matter how often characters refer to each other by names and cool monikers.

The art’s Joe Staton and Dave Hunt. Not their worst, but not any good either.

Legion is wearing me down. Who wants to read about these asswipes.

Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes (1977) #255

Superboy the Legion of Super Heroes 255

In a genuinely startling event, it turns out when it comes to Joe Staton, sometimes you have to fight fire with fire—this issue features Staton’s most successful work. His inker? Vince Colletta. It’s not good art by any stretch, but it’s far more competent and consistent than Staton’s been on the book. Will Colletta be back to save the world from Staton’s pencils? Who knows, the issue feels like a fill-in.

The end of the last issue promised a Brainiac 5 resolution. This issue also promises a Brainiac 5 resolution… for the next issue. Instead, it’s a very Superboy story for Superboy and the Legion. He’s back home in Smallville, trying to be a regular kid in the fifties or sixties or teens, except he’s just too darn super. Lana Lang is on to him, so he’s got to do hijinks while helping out at Pa Kent’s store.

The Smallville sojourn doesn’t last long, with the Legionnaires coming back in time on a mission. Someone robbed the Superman Museum in the future, and they need Superboy’s glasses, except the future villain already came back in time and stole the glasses while he was distracted at work. They go back to the future, fight, fail, then go back to Krypton before it explodes to swipe some more Kryptonian glass, which is renowned around the galaxy.

Why couldn’t the bad guy go back in time to Krypton himself, maybe even head to a glass factory? Don’t ask.

There’s a funny moment when the Legionnaires ask Superboy to suit up–they wouldn’t want anyone seeing Clark Kent with some scantily clad exhibitionist time travelers. It’s unfortunately not self-aware; writer Gerry Conway keeps the plot moving, but there’s nothing to it. Clark’s bored in Smallville because it’s dull, and he’s not wrong; Conway writes a dull Superboy solo story.

It’s a mediocre narrative, but the not-horrendous art gets it through. Staton and Collettta. I’d never have guessed it.