Legion of Super-Heroes #277 (1981)
by Gerry Conway (plot), Roy Thomas (script) & Jim Janes (pencils)
cover by George Perez
The last storyline of the Conway era shares writing duties with Roy Thomas, who will then take over for five issues.
According to the cover Reflecto is here “because we demanded it”, so… did anyone actually wanted Reflecto to show up?
But just who is Reflecto? His identity in-universe will be the big mystery of the storyline, but in our reality he showed up waaaaaaay back in Adventure Comics #354, a story of the Adult Legion that causes endless continuity troubles.
You might remember that, on the cover, Superman sees a bunch of statues dedicated to dead Legionnaires.
When the story was published, Ferro Lad was the only one of these guys we had already met.
Chemical King first showed up a year later, in Adventure Comics #371, and died in Superboy #228 to prevent War World VII. He’s the only straightforward example of the Adult Legion’s future becoming canon.
Then there’s Quantum Queen, showing up in Adventure Comics #375 as a member of the Wanderers. She never joined the Legion, not even during the Five Year Gap like a lot of minor heroes. Her statue says she “perished preventing an escape from Cosmic Prison”; as far as I know we never saw anything like that.
Then there’s Shadow Woman. She’s clearly supposed to be Shadow Lass, who Shooter will soon create in Adventure Comics #365… except she doesn’t have blue skin on the cover. Paul Levitz will go out of his way to give a very convoluted nod to this connection.
But that has NOTHING on the absolute insanity that is Reflecto. This will take several issues to resolve, but rest assured that things will get really, REALLY bonkers with him.
But let’s get into today’s issue. We begin with the Legion saving a boat of camel-people from planet Dromedan.
Yep. We’re clearly leaving subtlety at the door here.
Phantom Girl goes underwater to free the ship from a tentacle monster, and she’s knocked out when she becomes tangible for a few seconds.
While drowning she has a vision of Ultra Boy, because if Jim James wants to draw a topless mermaid he’s going to do it whether it makes sense or not.
But that’s no, dream because… Shades Of Infra-Space (WTF!?), someone really did kiss her to save her life.
This looks like a job for Off-Brand Superman!
He flies to Legion HQ, where… Fire Rings of Yod (double WTF!?), Brainiac 5 is spouting Roy Thomas dialogue!
Brainy sounds the alarm, alerting the resident couples. It’s kind of funny that the newlyweds are shown in bed, while the couple that is clearly out of the honeymoon phase is having breakfast.
Funnier than the lazy “Bouncing Boy likes to eat” joke.
Turns out Phantom Girl is fine. At first glance the Legionnaires being hostile feels strange, but then again Off-Brand Superman just showed up with their unconscious friend in his arms, so I can kind of understand them thinking he might have attacked her.
Luckily for them, Reflecto is too boring to be a threat to anyone.
With that sorted out… kinda… the Legion interrogates the Dromedan captain. And I hate to harp on poor Roy Thomas, but this is a neat example of his writing quirks that I can’t stand.
Why does the alien bring up that the cargo ship is similar to “the hovercraft of centuries ago”? HE’S A CAMEL ALIEN A THOUSAND YEARS IN THE FUTURE!!! Why should he know what an hovercraft is!? It’s not like this is for the reader’s benefit: did 1981 readers REALLY need to be spoonfed this information!?
His tale goes on for a while, but the important part is that they were targeted by someone who uses high tech and chains. And who apparently has a ray that can turn sea weed into tentacle monsters.
Reflecto simply leaves, something that makes Wildfire very angry. Which is not saying much, since pretty much everything irritates him, but he does have a point: 99% of superpowered heroes that run into the Legion but don’t join later show up as supervillains, so having SOME level of investigation is not a bad idea. He goes overboard because he’s Wildfire and that’s kind of his thing, but it’s not completely random this time.
Lightning Lad is blaming himself for the recent Legion troubles. It’s actually mostly the fault of the constant changes in writers, and the fact that the “Brainiac 5 is insane” plot was all kinds of stupid, but it’s neat to see it reflected in the story.
Plus it’s a chance to have Wildfire show that he’s not a one-note character: you’d expect him to go against LL even harder, but it turns out the founder is his own harshest critic.
So it’s decided: the team is such a mess that Gerry Conway leaves Lightning Lad resigns.
It’s time to reveal the villain of the story. And just to make sure we know he’s a villain, he’s introduced hunting down polar bears at the North Pole.
We already saw with the assault on the ship that the villain uses chains, so it’s no surprise that we are dealing with Grimbor once again.
Grimbor has always been ridiculous to some extent, but there’s a reason why he’s S&M Reed Richards: he has the technology to deploy a fleet of energy-shooting satellites around Earth…
…that he uses to CHAIN THE PLANET!!!
Despite how they look they’re not actually metal chains, but an energy field that destroys any ship that attempts to land!!!
This is AMAZING.
Grimbor then projects a hologram of himself to make demands: he will release Earth only if he’s made its dictator and the Legion surrenders.
As great as the premise of Grimbor chaining the planet is… Earth can’t feed itself for a single week without importing food? REALLY!?
Granted, we don’t know how many people live on Earth in the 30th century, but even if it’s supposed to be grossly overpopulated… A WEEK!? That’s just stupid!!!
Who’s in charge of feeding these people!?
Your irregular reminder that the government of the United Planets is, in fact, freaking useless.
So the team is split in two: half of them will face Grimbor, while the other half will investigate why he went for the Dromedan cargo and suffer going through Roy Thomas dialogue.
(“Bubble-Bottom”? Did Blok just call Bouncing Boy a fatass?)
Reflecto joins the team, and we end with a honestly great shot of Karate Kid and Projectra going back to HQ while the giant energy chains loom in the sky.
Legion significance: 5/10
Kicking off the whole Reflecto storyline. While it doesn’t have a ton of importance in the grand scheme of things, it is still significant.
Silver Age-ness: 8/10
THE EARTH IN CHAINS!!!
Does it stand the test of time? 7/10
There’s some unnecessary padding and I’ve made clear what I think of the dialogues… but nothing that can’t be fixed. Grimbor’s plan is some classic sci-fi nonsense, and the team dynamics are very interesting. Still, I have to remove some points for the frankly idiotic idea that 30th century Earth can’t survive A WEEK without importing food from other planets.
We are legion
21 Legionnaires
6 reserve members
1 on sick leave (Matter-Eater Lad)
1 presumed dead (Ultra Boy)