Comics Archeology

Legionnaires #33 (1996)
written by Tom Peyer & Tom McCraw
pencils and cover by Jeff Moy

Look who’s back!

The mysterious assassin from the previous issue is the Reboot version of Starfinger.
Kind of.

Thankfully, Saturn Girl is taking charge.

The United Planets should have closed down the Time Institute AFTER Rond Vidar left, because he’s smart enough to delete his entire research.
Kind of ironic that the Time Institute’s legacy is not ruined thanks to bad timing.

Good to know that even a thousand years into the future, you still need to be very careful what orders you give to a computer.

Rond is not Starfinger’s target.

Great bit of worldbuilding to have anti-telepathy technology when there’s a whole planet of telepaths around. Although that opens the question why every single bad guy doesn’t carry one.

Saturn Girl, that Thought-Scrambler™ did more damage than you realize if you’re confusing your fist with your foot.

Starfinger IS incredibly dangerous…

….but this is Saturn Girl we’re talking about.

Although it’s implied that Starfinger WOULD have killed her if he hadn’t hesitated.

In other plots, Live Wire is missing and Spark likes her haircut.
She definitely does: if I’m not mistaken, she doesn’t change it even once throughout this entire continuity! That’s QUITE rare for super-heroines.

Last issue introduced Star Boy but didn’t really do anything with him.

Leviathan is also impatient for Star Boy to prove himself. But he’s not exactly the most popular Legionnaire right now… he might be even less popular than Cosmic Boy, and currently every Legionnaire has something against Cosmic Boy.

Yeah I’m with Star Boy on this one. What else is he supposed to do!?

Well he COULD develop uncontrollable new powers.

Gates prevents him from electrocuting the team by teleporting him into the pool.

Gates, I love you buddy, but you’re not helping.

While I still don’t get how Saturn Girl lost track of Lori when she was literally next to her (and Starfinger attacked AFTER she lost Lori)…
Guys, if you can’t even keep track of one kid, are you really ready to be superheroes?

Thanks Violet, the drama has been getting out of hand.

Speaking of Cosmic Boy, this is when the President calls…

…asking the Legion to take care of Starfinger.

Look I can’t show EVERY page, Cosmic Boy, but you need to pay more attention to these reviews.

The fact that Gates sees the Legion as an invading army is played for laughs, and he IS wrong here… but considering that he was drafted against his consent AND the Legion is doing several jobs for the President without much of the team agreeing with her, he might be onto something in general.

How I presume every Legion fan would react after showing up in their timeline.

Aaaand Lori immediately gets into trouble for a hate crime.
In her defense, the owner IS adorable.

Brainiac 5 is in jail, but don’t feel bad for him. He’s passing his time with his third favorite activity: thinking.
The second would be running experiments and the first would be complaining.

But as anticipated by the cover, the biggest development is in Kinetix’s plot.
We have an official confirmation that Mysa has taken her to the Reboot version of Sorcerers’ World, as she hinted in her dialogue last issue.

We have a weird throwaway line about Mysa using magic to prevent the Legion to care about her disappearance. It sounds like some course correction after the writers took way too long to pick up this plot.

Uhm, Kinetix, maybe don’t accept to eat weird plants just because they’re from the person who kidnapped you and is preventing your friends from contacting you?

The reason why Mysa has recruited Kinetix is that she wants her help to retrieve a powerful magic artifact.

This would have been an amazing reveal if it wasn’t SPOILED ON THE COVER.

I can see why you thought that Kinetix would help you destroy the Eye, Mysa, no notes.

The Legion has reached the planet they’re supposed to protect from Starfinger.

Disintegrating rays are just an unfair advantage.

This wouldn’t have happened if this was one of the continuities where the Flight Ring also provides life support.

The only Legionnaire standing is Shrinking Violet, leaving us with this issue’s cliffhanger.

Legion significance: 8/10
As you might have guessed, the Emerald Eye is going to play a huge role. Prevented from a higher score by the fact that technically the Eye doesn’t show up… but Starfinger’s arrival marks the beginning of the final arc of the draft era.

Silver Age-ness: 4/10
I can totally see the Lori scene in a pre-Crisis story.

Does it stand the test of time? 8/10
We are juggling A LOT of plots, but I think that they’re still pretty easy to follow while also giving most of the cast something to do.
I still think that Lori getting lost is way too forced, and I think that starting a plot about Star Boy’s power instability in this SECOND story is a mistake.

Moy Tongues: 15

Who did it better?
Star Boy’s new power is absolutely a nod to the Superboy-like powers he had in his very first appearance, but since we don’t really know this version of the character yet, it’s way too early to mess with his powers.
But I also didn’t like his original powerset either, so for me this is a rare loss for BOTH continuities.

We also have a new Starfinger, and just like the original his identity is a mystery.
Given the powers he demonstrates I don’t think anyone was truly fooled about who is behind the mask… but there are multiple characters who are not currently official Legionnaires yet that ARE missing, so perhaps the intention was to have some mystery.
Especially since he hesitated when he was supposed to kill Saturn Girl…

We are legion