Legion of Super-Heroes v2 #264 (1980)
by Gerry Conway & Jim Janes
cover by Dick Giordano
Who’s going for “most fanservice costume”, Shadow Lass or Tyroc?
We begin with the team nearly causing a car accident. See people, this is why we can’t have flying cars.
The Legionnaires are upset about the kidnapping of their parents, and needless to say Wildfire is the most upset one. However Light Lass has such an improvement over her character that she’s able to shup him up quickly.
Thanks to her tracking powers, Dawnstar finds where the parents are being held hostage. But there’s something that prevents her from getting any closer.
When the Legion attacks, however, they discover the facility is protected by teenage mutant ninja bats.
Wildfire takes care of them. It’s kind of hilarious that he takes offense at the idea that he killed them. Considering how he’s behaved recently, can you blame Saturn Girl?
She doesn’t find anyone here, though. For some reason she takes off her gloves, at least according to the colorist.
See Wildfire, this is exactly why your teammates were not trusting you to stay calm in the heat of battle.
Dagon has been watching the Legion behind the scenes, revealing he has found a way to protect himself from Dawnstar’s tracking power. At this point he’s kidnapped all living parents of the Legionnaires (at least those he knows are still living).
Being able to give Dawnstar a false track is quite impressive: I don’t think anyone else will manage to do the same thing.
The Legion has an ace up their sleeve: continuity!
Remember issue #222? I won’t blame you if you don’t, since it wasn’t that great, but that’s where we discovered Tyroc has the very random ability to scan the city (among another dozen powers).
Interesting to see Shadow Lass point out she gets along with Tyroc. I’ve speculated before that Shadow Lass might have been originally intended to be black and not blue, but in any case she DID share more panels with Tyroc than most Legionnaires.
Your regular reminder that the Legion is just terrible at security.
Light Lass is really on a roll in this storyline, managing to reduce the number of suspects to two people. Let’s see… which of these could be Dagon?
This being a 1980 comic it’s not impossible for him to be a woman wearing a disguise, but I don’t trust the guy whose ID card shows him screaming.
The “security storage chambers” are locked, so the Legion has to get inside by brute force… and by Wildfire exploding because it’s kind of his thing.
Remember that Wildfire is invisible and intangible in his energy form, but at least he’s learned to speak. It probably wouldn’t be necessary in this scenario, thanks to Saturn Girl, but that’ll be handy in future occasions.
I told you the Legion is bad at security. Shouldn’t they know about this stuff much, MUCH earlier?
Wildfire is the first to reach Dagon’s base, and just in time to save his parents.
Aaaand Dagon is taken down three panels later. Despite an interesting design, he kind of sucks.
And so we end with two epilogues: one revealing that the Legion now has a moving emergency bunker (!!!!!)…
…and Tyroc’s island nation of Marzal vanishing into another dimension.
Which would remove Tyroc from the Legion, but since Shadow Lass and Dawnstar are there when this happens we’re going to need a full issue dedicated to the story.
Legion significance: 3/10
The lead-in to the last Tyroc appearance (in this era at least), but it’s still easily skippable.
Silver Age-ness: 0/10
Nothing stands out.
Does it stand the test of time? 8/10
While I found the previous issue more enjoyable, this was still good. Light Lass continues to improve, and even Wildfire is getting slightly more stable.
We are legion
22 Legionnaires
6 reserve members
1 on sick leave (Matter-Eater Lad)