ADVENTURE COMICS 337 (1965)
by Edmond Hamilton & John Forte
The first superhero double wedding?
We begin with the Legion holding a meeting to discuss the latest menace. Brainiac 5 is so angry about Ultra Boy and Phantom Girl being more interested in flirting that his face turns grey.
He’s harsh towards Saturn Girl and Lightning Lad as well. Curiously, while we’ve been shown Ultra Boy and Phantom Girl being into each other a few times, this is the first occasion where Saturn Girl and Lightning Lad are depicted as a couple (not counting the stories set in their future).
This is also the story that establish that Legionnaires cannot be married and stay in the team.
It’s a questionable law to begin with, but it’s especially weird when you consider that they have this rule while at the same time their headquarters has a museum dedicated to wedding customs.
Considering that all Legion members are teenagers at this point, it’s amazing this hasn’t happened before.
There are alien spies looking at them while they’re making out, proving that Kandor City doesn’t have the exclusive on privacy invasion.
The aliens ambush Saturn Girl and Lightning Lad has to stop them in a rather awkwardly drawn fight scene.
This makes Lightning Lad realize that he loves Saturn Girl too much to see her in danger, and decides to marry her to leave the Legion.
Did I mention that these are all teenagers, or is the angst enough indication?
And so the first Legion wedding takes place, complete with the Legionnaires holding action figures on a stick!
Four members leaving at the same time leaves the team short-handed with only 15 active members, so you know what that means… audition time!
Two members of the Substitute Heroes try again, with exactly the same result.
Naturally all the disguised aliens are accepted: one of them under the name Size Lad.
(ah, the innocent days where they didn’t think about the possibility of this leading to dirty jokes…)
Then there’s Blackout Boy, who is interesting because he basically has the same exact power of future member Shadow Lass.
And Magnetic Kid, who has the same codename of Cosmic Boy’s little brother but has a different power.
It’s not long before the spies stage an attack on the new members, only to reveal themselves and incapacitate the real Legionnaires.
All of this was to steal the Legion’s secret plans, and they succeed.
Except… it turns out that Saturn Girl knew all along that the aliens were planning to learn the Legion’s secrets, and Brainiac 5 came up with the marriage plan!
Yep! You thought this was yet another case of “the Legion is full of idiots who are easily infiltrated”? Think again: this was on purpose!
In fact, instead of gaining the secret of Earth’s defenses… the aliens brought the Legion to their own planet.
And their super-science being capable of giving them super-powers isn’t much use with Element Lad around.
And as a cherry on top: the Substitutes weren’t really rejected, they were part of the whole act!
And so we end with the aliens defeated and humiliated. Not to mention a much deserved smooching session.
Saturn Girl and Lightning Lad will eventually marry for real in 1977 (well, in-story they marry in 2982).
Phantom Girl and Ultra Boy will have to wait for the reboot to marry, in 1997.
Legion significance: 2/10
The rule about married members having to resign is little more than a footnote. It will be invoked a couple of times but not taken very seriously. It’s also where the relationship between Saturn Girl and Lightning Lad is properly established.
Silver Age-ness: 2/10
The aliens having pills that give super-powers is typical of the era, but even that is slightly excused by the setting.
Does it stand the test of time? 8/10
Light-years ahead of most of the stories so far. The marriage rule is quite silly and the aliens are as generic as they come, but the characterization is solid and Brainy’s plan is something else: it makes sense in-story, plus it exploits the expectations from the previous “there’s a bad guy in the team” stories, AND every out of character interaction has a plausible explanation!
We are legion
15 Legionnaires active in this story
4 not shown but officially member: everyone has at least a cameo except Supergirl (as usual), Invisible Kid (unless he’s invisible), Matter Eater Lad and Star Boy (who have no excuse)
1 reserve member: Bouncing Boy
2 resigned member: Dream Girl, Command Kid
1 honorary member: Elastic Lad
1 deceased member: Dynamo Boy
How much Legion is too much?
I’m not adding the alien spies as members since it was all just a trick.
The Legion has 19 active members. The total number of characters who have been members is 24.