SUPERBOY 212 (1975)
by Jim Shooter & Mike Grell
Considering there was no audition shown during the Shooter era, it’s only fitting that with his return Shooter gives us a story with six new rejects!
One of the most unique aspects of the Legion is that many of its members come from planets where everybody has the same power. But that leads to some obvious problems… if you have an entire planet full if, say, people with magnetic powers… why do you only have ONE in your team?
Second, if you only have one representative from each world, what makes them unique?
This story addresses both points.
After we meet rejected member Magno Lad (one guess about his powers), he’s recruited by a team where everybody has a duplicate power from a Legionnaire.
And they do have a point: just because the Legion already has a member with magnetic powers, why can’t he be replaced?
Also note that they just gave up trying to find an excuse to have both Superboy and Supergirl on the team, so the rule doesn’t apply to Supergirl because nepotism.
The Legion’s reaction to the rejects’ challenge is bot hilarious and appropriate.
Also it’s really, REALLY hard to take Phantom Lad seriously with THAT outfit!!!
Let’s see who these new rejects are. There’s Magno Lad, who has the same powers of Cosmic Boy… only more.
After this story he will join the ever-growing Legion of Super-Villains.
There’s Esper Lass, who is both more powerful than Saturn Girl AND is wearing less clothes.
She will also join the LSV later on.
There’s Phantom Lad and Micro Lad, whose advantage over their counterparts is being male (what the heck, 1975?) and Chameleon Kid who is just “stronger”.
Micro Lad will join the LSV, but the other two will never show up again.
And finally we have Calorie Queen, a.k.a. “Matter-Eater Lad but she’s actually useful”.
In addition to having an extremely 70s costume, she’s an interesting case. This is her last pre-Crisis appearance (unless I’m missing a cameo), but she will return after the 5 Year Gap in a truly hilarious role… more on that later.
The Legionnaires have lost against the rejects, and pretty badly. Superboy has to show up to save their asses!
The other Legionnaires don’t appreciate it. AT ALL.
There’s also a subplot about someone talking to the President of Earth about the Legion losing a members soon. We’ll get to it shortly.
So… rematch between the Legionnaires and their rejected counterparts.
I don’t do this often, but check out Mike Grell’s fantastic choice of panel placement.
Notice how we have the tall panel on the left side, showing the height of the pole, which falls into the same direction of the top panel.
So here we get to the solution Shooter proposes for why a particular Legionnaire is chosen from a world full of people with super-powers.
It’s not about who is the strongest one, but who can use his/her power more effectively and can work better within a team!
The rejects also made the mistake of targeting only their counterparts…
…or of being complete f##king idiots.
That’s when the subplot comes back to bite the Legion: Matter-Eater Lad has been drafted!
Not into the army, mind you! He’s been drafted into POLITICS.
It doesn’t exactly come out of nowhere. This ties into the Adult Legion from Adventure Comics 354.
He even recommends giving Calorie Queen another shot, but sadly this goes nowhere for now.
He won’t actually get to be President of Bismoll, but he will get pretty close… especially thanks to Calorie Queen, who as his assistant will pretty much do the actual work for him.
Matter-Eater Lad leaves the team this issue, but he’s not going to disappear from this continuity… he’s even going to save the universe!
He will rise to prominence after the 5 Year Gap; he’s the only Legionnaire which I actually prefer in that version. He’s basically a forgettable footnote before that, but he will become truly hilarious.
Moving on to the second story, which is firmly in the “Why didn’t we think of this before???” category: a Shadow Lass / Night Girl team-up.
And Night Girl easily wins the “Most Fanservice Costume” award!!!
She even takes a bullet for Shadow Lass.
The crooks manage to escape while Shadow Lass takes care of Night Girl.
They really are quite a team… Shadow Lass has a useful power but isn’t terribly powerful herself, while Night Girl is extremely strong but she has a colossal weakness.
Still, Shadow Lass has a point.
We delve a little into her characterization. When she’s on her planet she is ALWAYS super-strong (because there is no sun there); the reason she left the planet is that her super-strength made all guys really insecure.
That’s apparently the basis for her infatuation with Cosmic Boy.
Unfortunately Cosmic Boy is being uncharacteristically dickish this time.
What a jackass. At least his date goes suitably wrong… possibly because he took her to see a Charles Bronson movie?
The crooks take the opportunity to ambush him as soon as he’s ditched his date… and Night Girl completely fails at rescuing him.
You might think this comic would now show off that Night Girl is still a competent hero despite her crippling weakness… but no, we end with Cosmic Boy saving her and NEVER APOLOGIZING FOR HOW HE TREATED HER.
Dammit pre-Crisis Cosmic Boy, you’re making it REALLY hard for me to like you!
Historical significance
First story: 6/10
Matter-Eater Lad leaves, plus the introduction of several people. Only Calorie Queen will really matter (pun intended), but that will be decades from now. Everybody else is just cannon fodder for the Legion of Super-Villains, really.
Second story: 0/10
Completely forgettable unless you’re here for the fanservice (Night Girl’s costume will remain for a few appearances).
Silver Age-ness
First story: 2/10
Pretty low on the DC scale, but still… Bismoll drafts politicians and they HAVE to select M.E.L.? Plus it’s kind of hilarious that most of these supposedly superior versions of the Legionnaires are actually really bad at this.
Second story: 8/10
Night Girl left her planet, where presumably she would’ve been the only superhero… because she wanted to find a boyfriend.
Does it stand the test of time?
First story: 8/10
It’s nothing revolutionary and it gets silly at times, but in a good way. It was about time we addressed the problem with entire planets full of people with the same power; I’m not entirely convinced the solution is the best one we could get, but I was satisfied.
Second story: -3/10
This was bad. Really, really bad. Almost a character assassination of both Cosmic Boy and Night Girl! He shows absolutely zero respect for her abilities as a superhero, and his final joke is kind of creepy. And while having Shadow Lass around makes things a little better, there’s more sexism than I expected from a 1975 comic. Even giving Shooter the benefit of the doubt that the message is not the one he intended… this one warrants the FIRST negative score in the Legion retrospective.
You’re WAY better than this, Legion!!!
We are legion
22 Legionnaires
6 reserve members
3 honorary members: Elastic Lad, Pete Ross, Rond Vidar
1 resigned member: Command Kid
1 expelled member: Nemesis Kid
3 deceased members: Dynamo Boy, Ferro Lad, Invisible Kid
How much Legion is too much?
The total number of characters who have been members is 36.
Legion rejects: 36
Thanks to the six (!!!) rejects from this issue, at this point the Legion has admitted as many members as it has rejected! Isn’t that cool?