Superboy and the LSH #233 (1977)
“The Infinite Man Who Conquered Time The Legion” by Paul Levitz & Jim Sherman
“The Final Illusion” by Paul Levitz & Michael Netzer
cover by Mike Grell
That’s not a joke, the title is seriously “The Infinite Man Who Conquered Time The Legion”, including the crossed out word.
No wonder this is one of my all-time favorite Legion stories.
No, seriously, it’s on the first page!
In the 30th century, everyone is doing fanservice. Even space pirates!
These are the Sklarian Raiders, an all-female cadre of space pirates whose entire deal is stealing technology while looking good doing it.
No wonder the Legion has so many reboots, they were messing with Hyper-Time back in the 70s!
The Legion deals with the pirates rather easily before jumping to the actual plot, but not before Wildfire has the opportunity to be snarky.
Yeah Wildfire is kind of an ass, but he’s not entirely wrong. Main plot first, guys, romantic subplots later!
“Hyper-Time” in this particular case doesn’t refer to DC’s incomprehensible attempt to recreate the multiverse without calling it a multiverse, but to a sort of super time machine.
This particular time machine is going to circle all of time, in an attempt to prove that time is circular.
What could possibly go wrong?
Well apparently the project works better than intended: instead of sending the volunteer though one circle of time, it goes through billions of the exact same loop. THAT’S TERRIFYING!!!
The origin of Infinite Man is one of the scariest concepts I’ve ever read: experiencing the entire life of the universe, from beginning to end, in an endless loop.
Infinite Man has time powers, because of course, and we learn that Superboy is a young Earth creationist if he really believes dinosaurs have been extinct for only “thousands” of years.
Anyone capable of taking down Superboy like that is automatically a heavy hitter.
But if you thought that was just to get Superboy out of the story early, think again!
Because even though Infinite Man has sent him through time and space…
…Superboy IMMEDIATELY comes back to punch Infinite Man!
Okay, that was kind of a badass move.
But not as impressive as Infinite Man being possibly the very first villain with time powers to take the obvious route and just freaking using them!!!
And because Infinite Man wasn’t a scary enough concept: he can just leave and spend a thousand years plotting his next move, and show up at any moment with as much power as he needs.
What I love about the story is that it’s not really about fighting Infinite Man. It’s about how the Legion deals with the very distinct possibility that they are doomed to fail.
One of the best uses of Wildfire’s design. He typically wears his heart on his sleeve, but the fact that he literally can’t have a facial expression gets used to great effect here.
Also, the story seems to recognize that Infinite Man really, REALLY should be unbeatable…
…and so gives him a fatal flaw: wanting to make Rond Vidar suffer as much as he has.
Yes it’s kind of a cliché having the villain not killing the victim right away, sure, but the fact that Infinite Man gives priority to this sense of dread really makes him feel unique.
The theme of not being able to change destiny (because time is circular) is reinforced by Dream Girl not having answers from the seers of her planet, and knowing full well that she won’t get back to Earth to help her team.
It’s little moments like these that makes me love the Levitz run.
One of the surprisingly rare times we get to see Brainiac 5’s planet. Considering it’s a planet full of geniuses you’d expect them to show up more often, but unfortunately they’re barely ever useful.
Also: “a billion billion bytes” is STILL impressive in 2021, at least from an Earth perspective, since it’s 1 billion gigabytes.
Only the Legion could introduce timeless cosmic ghosts in a throwaway scene and just leave them there. I don’t think they’re ever referenced again… just goes to show how crazy the 30th century is.
When Infinite Man actually does show up, the Legion doesn’t stand much of a chance.
Rond Vidar even tries to sacrifice himself, explaining it was an accident. Infinite Man explaining the kind of messed up torture he experiences is chilling.
It’s time for Brainiac 5 to shine. Not only because his force field is shown to hold back Infinite Man, which considering what he’s been able to do is quite impressive on its own…
…but he’s come up with a plan! Remove the time machine’s failsafe…
…then pump even more power into it…
…and force the time loop to start again and again, FOREVER.
And so the Legion has won the fight against Infinite Man, basically because he was too insane to use his powers properly.
But we’re not done with the dread, because the end is a promise that Infinite Man will be back.
Considering his following appearances are:
1986 Crisis on Infinite Earths
1988 THE very best Time Trapper story ever told, “Life and Death at the End of Time”
1994 the end of the original continuity
…yeah Infinite Man is very bad news whenever he shows up.
Moving to a less intellectual story, which I believe is about Princess Projectra doing everything she can to win this era’s Most Fanservice categories.
The story is based on an idea by penciler Mike Nasser, which I guess might have been “give me an excuse to show Projectra sleeping in her revealing costume for ten pages”.
So Projectra has slipped into a coma because she’s experienced the Karate Kid series?
Lucky her. I had to review it!
I get why Saturn Girl was asked to help, since this is apparently psychological.
But what are Chameleon Boy and Dream Girl supposed to DO!?
Well, surprisingly enough, Dream Girl wasn’t put into the story for the fanservice!
I mean, she IS, but it’s also because she’s the dream expert.
See, the problem is that Projectra misses Karate Kid so much that she’s created an entire fictional reality where they’re a happy couple and… wait, is Levitz doing WandaVision 44 years early!?
Thanks to Dream Girl’s suggestion, Saturn Girl enters Projectra’s mind to give her a nightmare.
And it’s, uhm… it’s something.
Saturn Girl might’ve been too hardcore. For some reason, it’s Chameleon Boy to come up with the right solution.
The answer was significantly easier than Saturn Girl’s solution.
And so we end with Princess Projectra waking up, leaving the doctor rather confused.
Look out, Dream Girl, you have competition for the fanservice awards.
Historical significance
Infinite Man: 10/10
Despite a grand total of FOUR appearances, Infinite Man is a big deal whenever he appears.
Projectra: 0/10
Harmless fluff.
Silver Age-ness
Infinite Man: 8/10
Time is circular and if you go far ahead to re-start the universe, plus if you do it a bunch of time you turn into a giant with a goody helmet. Loses some points for highlighting the horror of the experience.
Projectra: 6/10
By the 70s, one would expect “she had a psychotic breakdown because she misses her boyfriend” would not be treated so casually.
Does it stand the test of time?
Infinite Man: 10/10
An ironic category given the subject, I know.
Like I said this is one of my favorite Legion stories so I admit my bias. It’s not a perfect story by any means… without the atmosphere and the tension it’s an extremely basic story, with the villain losing in a kind of lame way… but the atmosphere and tension are soooo good.
You could easily, EASILY reprint this today.
Projectra: 7/10
It’s basically an excuse for crazy nightmare scenes and some cheesecake. Really the only thing you should change today would blame some kind of space virus or something, otherwise Projectra would come off as quite unhinged.
We are legion
23 Legionnaires
6 reserve members
Interesting letters: the reactions to the death of Chemical King are overwhelmingly positive, and we get an official explanation for why he was killed off.
One thing I neglected to highlight in his final story is that his death had been established even before Chemica King joined the team, in the Adult Legion story of Adventure Comics #354… poor dolt.
