Legion of Super-Heroes v2 #266 (1980)
by Gerry Conway & Jim Janes
cover by Dick Giordano
Let’s face it, this is not the weirdest thing the Legion has met.
We catch up with Bouncing Boy and Duo Damsel, who are still on the frozen planet they were helping colonize in the Ditko story from issue 257.
A nice character moment as Duo Damsel realizes her husband is bummed that future technology makes everything too easy.
An explosion knocks him out, but Bouncing Boy never wastes an opportunity to lighten the mood.
And to make out with his wife, but can blame him?
The explosion leads to the evil genie Kantuu being released, and he immediately leaves the planet.
This looks like a job for Bouncing Boy! SOMEHOW.
Chuck, you don’t get to complain about technology making things too easy when you take with you so much Legion tech. Do all reserves get that, or just him?
We check on the Legion when Element Lad is having fun teasing Colossal Boy about who has the most useful power.
That’s an easy win when you have Element Lad’s power. But it’s also worth nothing that Colossal Boy is quite underwhelming here… struggling to lift 30 tons would make him a lightweight among Marvel strongmen, let alone DC where super-strength feats tend to go into absurdity much faster.
Their bet is interrupted by an emergency call. It’s very rare to see Duo Damsel being called Luornu Taine, to the point I wondered if taking the husband’s last name was not a thing on her planet.
Then again, if your maiden name is Durgo, most last names are an improvement.
Also notice the reference about the couple no longer being members… they’ve been explicitly called reserves in earlier appearances, but in this issue they repeatedly talk about leaving the team entirely.
At the moment I’m still counting them in the reserves, but if they keep this up I’ll remove them.
Apparently nobody in the 30th century speaks Arabic. This will make sense once the fact that everyone is always speaking Interlac will be better established, but at this point it looks like most characters are just speaking English.
We are definitely in a “tell, don’t show” mood in this issue, aren’t we?
Colossal Boy is skeptical about genies for no reason!
Dude… one of your worst enemies is an evil sorcerer from a planet of magicians, one of your teammates is the princess of a medieval planet, another is the sister of an actual witch, and you’ve even fought a relative of Mr. Mxyzptlk… but you draw the line at genies!?
Granted, Colossal Boy was not in that awful story and everybody forgot it happened, but COME ON!!!
Time for Kantuu to do something impressive on-panel, and he’s quite underwhelming.
At least Colossal Boy realizes he was dead wrong. Not that he’s admitting it, of course.
The Legionnaires barely manage to hold the genie.
Time for Bouncing Boy to save the day!
Or not.
And that’s our cliffhanger!
What a forgettable issue. It’s always nice to catch up with Bouncing Boy and Duo Damsel, but they were pretty wasted and the villain is as boring as it gets.
Legion significance: 0/10 
Silver Age-ness: 7/10 
Does it stand the test of time? 3/10
We are legion
21 Legionnaires
6 reserve members
1 on sick leave (Matter-Eater Lad)
Interesting letters: so were there actual plans to bring back Tyroc in the 80s, or was this just a generic idea?
Gerry Conway was a competent storyteller, but I don’t think he was right for the Legion. Your comments illustrate why. He didn’t have a feel for the Legion’s history, and he didn’t understand some of the nuances. Yes, it makes no sense that Colossal Boy would doubt the existence of magic. However, I’m willing to pass off the “isn’t a member anymore” comment as simply a remark that reservists rarely if ever send Grade-A priority messages.