SUPERMAN 423 (1986)
by Alan Moore & Curt Swan
This fantastic story was intended as a swan song for the pre-Crisis Superman.
I’m only covering the part that connects to the Legion of Super-Heroes, because otherwise there’d be WAY too much stuff to cover.
Since it labels itself as an imaginary story its placement in the canon is dubious, even more so considering the convoluted relationship between Crisis and the Legion.
But, as the cover says, this is supposed to be the Legion’s last salute to Superman.
Even before the Legion shows up, there’s already one Legion connection: honorary member Pete Ross is killed.
I’m not counting him among the dead Legionnaires until we get to Crisis, though.
The Legion doesn’t show up until the end of the story, where they appear in the Fortress of Solitude.
The important part is WHO shows up among them: Supergirl, who from Superman’s point of view had recently died during Crisis On Infinite Earths.
Superman is pretty mad at Brainiac 5 for doing this to him.
Brainiac 5 counteracts pointing out that Superman knows the Legion’s future as well.
I’m confused about his wording: he says that SUPERBOY learned about the Legion’s future.
We have seen Superman interact with the Adult Legion several times, but I can’t recall Superboy doing it. Considering the rest of the references in this book are 100% spot-on I suspect that I’m just missing the reference.
It COULD be a mistake, but I’m giving Moore the benefit of the doubt, at least this time.
In a very subtle moment, after Brainiac 5 mentions that Superman knows which Legionnaires will die… the panel moves to Invisible Kid.
The reason why the Legion came back to this time was to give Superman a present (which will actually save his life in the second part of the story, but we’re not covering it this time).
Considering the really dark things that happened to Superman at the beginning of this story, he takes this to mean that this is their last tribute and that he’s going to die tomorrow.
Before Brainiac 5 can elaborate, Supergirl brings up the Silver Age time travel rules.
It was well established that it’s impossible to travel to a time where you already exist. Supergirl here is able to do this because her future self is now dead… but the excuse is that the future Supergirl is actually doing some time travel on her own.
“Supergirl is in the past” hits me right in the guts every time.
Absolutely brilliant line: Superman doesn’t lie to her once during their entire interaction.
And so the Legion of Super-Heroes returns to the 30th century…
…and we end with the most gut-wrenching Superman panel ever printed.
God I love this story.
I’m not doing the usual categories since this isn’t technically a review, but for the “test of time” part? READ THIS STORY. NOW.
You might be wondering: why bring up this story if you’re not reviewing it in its entirety?
Because placing this story in the Legion continuity is an interesting challenge.
Saturn Girl is wearing her classic outfit, so this must take place before Action Comics #392 (the last issue of that Legion run)… and that’s the only real clue we’re given.
That leaves an enormous window, but I figured I’d place this right after Action Comics 387 for a reason: it’s the issue where Superboy first leaves the team.
It would make little sense for the Legion to visit Superman on the day of his death while Superboy is on the team. But they’ve just said goodbye to their teammate, and they don’t know that he’ll rejoin rather soon… so after they’ve said goodbye to Superboy, they also do this with Superman.
Why would THESE specific Legionnaires be the ones to go back in time?
We have Brainiac 5 who presumably came up with the idea, plus the three founders. The selection of Invisible Kid is a little weirder (I mean in-story; see above the real reason), since he wasn’t shown to be particularly close to Superboy.Among those that I absolutely buy not wanting to do this are Mon-El, who was stuck in the Phantom Zone during this part of the 20th century so it’s understandable he wouldn’t want to witness it again, and Duo Damsel who already had a hard time saying goodbye to Superboy.
If I placed the time correctly Karate Kid was the leader at this time, but he was a very hands-off leader so I can see him not wanting to do this.
Maybe it is just me, but I am not seeing a mistake in the Brainiac speech about Superboy knowing their future. Superboy traditionally kept visiting the 30th century in carefully chosen moments so that his point of view kept a linear experience (and so that the Legionnaries did not become confused either). But Brainiac 5 could not trust that there would be no exceptions, and he was probably at least generally aware that the adult Superman would speak to him on occasion.
After all, the Legionnaires did turn up on 20th century fairly often, sometimes dealing with Superman instead of Superboy, including in DC Comics Presents #13, 43 and 80. He was presumably aware of many terrible events in their future, which is one reason why things were generally brighter during the periods when Superboy was an active member – it becomes increasingly harder to explain why Superman won’t even consider whether to warn or prepare his former teammates as those tragedies pile up.
World’s Finest #168 also comes to mind. Superman asks the adult Legion about the source of Composite Superman’s powers. Those are Legion statuettes, including one of Triplicate Girl, who by that point had become Duo Damsel. That matter is not raised at all, at least on panel.
Of course, that situation wasn’t treated consistently, nor could it. DC Comics Presents #43 addresses that, both by establishing that Brainiac 5 believes that they can become an alternate, inaccessible future and by showing that Superman has at least one memory gap from his time as Superboy (he does not know that Wildfire can survive the destruction of his costume).