Legion of Super-Heroes #294 (1982)
“Darkseid”
by Paul Levitz & Keith Giffen
It’s taken four parts, but Darkseid finally takes center stage: his name is the title of the story, and his face takes up most of the cover.
This issue is dedicated to Jack Kirby. Since he was still alive in 1982, I wonder if anyone ever asked him if he read this story?
Appropriately, Brainiac 5 is the one to deduce his identity. While the 30th century seems to know a lot about 20th century Superman, Darkseid is still considered a legend of sorts.
Does that mean most Jimmy Olsen stories are unknown? That’s fine by me!
With the understanding of what they’re up against, Dream Girl extends the call from active and regularly appearing reserves Legionnaires to EVERYBODY.
And I mean EVERYBODY.
Supergirl describes herself as having resigned. I’m still counting her as a reserve: if she responds to the general alarm she has to count as SOME kind of Legionnaire, right?
And… yeah, the Legion’s going to need all the help in the universe against THREE BILLION SUPERMAN-LEVEL enemies!!!
Luckily, the mind-controlled Daxamites are not fully in control of themselves. That’s the only thing that prevents them from just slaughtering everyone… but they’re still powerful enough and numerous enough to be a MASSIVE threat.
One of the things that makes this saga different is that not only it features all Legionnaires… all other 30th century heroes show up! From Dev-Em, to the Heroes of Lallor, who we haven’t seen in a while…
…but the MVPs are of course the Substitute Heroes, who even get an awesome splash page!
I love that in the above splash page COLOR KID is being useful, but Fire Lad… isn’t.
Even the freaking Wanderers make an appearance, and these guys NEVER show up for anything!
Light Lass longs for the old days when the Legion was still just a superhero club. Although she joined the Legion as a substitute for her brother when he was dead at the time, so it’s not like things were all that lighter.
One of the Servants takes the opportunity to try kidnapping the McGuffin Baby (who has now grown into a McGuffin Child). Sun Boy is of a different opinion…
…but it doesn’t matter, because the Servants defeats the Legionnaires and kidnap the child.
Speaking of children, this is when Chameleon Boy makes his only contribution to the saga: he’s being hunted down by a Daxamite kid.
It’s quite telling that he’s specifically looking for him, because he must’ve been sent by Darkseid personally… which means the Legion really got under his skin.
It’s also the clearest indication that these mind-controlled Daxamites are not as dangerous as they might been if they had full control of themselves.
Also this kid is totally dead, isn’t he? Well you’d think so, but he will show up later. We all know Validus is a big softie.
When we check back on the Legionnaires attacked by the Servants, we discover they survived because White Witch is awesome.
But Levitz is reinforcing the idea that, while she’s a magic user, she’s not working with the same rules of people like Doctor Fate. I like this; it makes easier to keep magicians in a team but it still leaves things vague enough to come up with new spells.
For example, she manages to subconsciously call the other Legionnaires for help, and better still, she’s going to be used DIRECTLY against Darkseid.
Also, I just love Saturn Girl’s no-nonsense attitude here!!! Privacy is important and all, but not when facing galaxy-ending threats.
White Witch is just amazing this issue. Extremely humble and selfless.
And despite her often repeating that her powers are limited, they’re nothing to sneeze at: she’s able to re-direct one of the Boom Tubes to lead the Legion to Darkseid himself.
Notice that only now that we know it’s Darkseid, these things really do go boom.
Worryingly, she has Darkseid’s attention now. That can’t possibly be a good thing.
With Darkseid calling back his Servants, this awakens the one that was captured by the Legion. So she tries to escape from Legion HQ.
However Shrinking Violet is the one to defeat her, by causing a brain aneurysm. (!!!)
While this is going on, most of the Legion is busy fighting the mind-controlled Daxamites.
Also you might have noticed that Giffen is going wild with their designs, but there’s a few that share the same costume. Is that a reference to something?
But the Legion’s trump card is actually Element Lad, who is able to take out who knows how many Daxamites!!! I’ve said it before, but when he’s written correctly he’s absurdly overpowered.
Normally I would worry that a move like that would be fatal for the Daxamites (unlike Kryptonite for Kryptonians, their lead poisoning is far mor persistent)… but I’m willing to bet that Brainiac 5 figured out the optimal amount of lead.
We haven’t seen the McGuffin Child for a while. He’s doing fine.
But he’s also the one to re-power White Witch.
This gives her enough power to switch the people between Daxam and Apokolips!!!
Some clarification is needed, because this will be important soon. Before this scene:
A) the Legion and the Daxamites were on Daxam (shaped like Darkseid’s head) under a yellow sun
B) Apokolips was under a red sun, with nobody on it
Now it’s the other way around:
A) the Legion and the Daxamites are on Apokolips under a red sun
B) Daxam (shaped like Darkseid’s head) is under a yellow sun, with nobody on it
Darkseid takes his revenge against the Legionnaires, and there’s a lot of lore behind HOW he tortures them!
Lighting Lad lost his arm in Adventure Comics #332 against the SUPER MOBY DICK OF SPACE.
Wildfire was first dissipated in Superboy #195.
Duo Damsel lost her first duplicate in Adventure Comics #340.
Bouncing Boy first lost his powers in Adventure Comics #321.
Ultra Boy and Timber Wolf get fears linked to their origin stories… but Dream Girl gets a generic fear of ugliness. At least Saturn Girl’s fear, while unrelated to any specific story, feels right for a telepath.
But the real target is the McGuffin Child, who Darkseid targets by ripping off the Sistine Chapel in a gorgeous two-page spread.
However Shadow Lass protects the McGuffin Child with a bubble of darkness…
…which then reveals the McGuffin Child was actually a reincarnated Highfather this whole time, and the Servant is transformed into Orion.
One of the things that held back the Fourth World, in my opinion, was the fact that it was established Orion was destined to defeat Darkseid… but without Kirby, nobody had the courage to actually let that happened, so the characters continued to exist in a sort of limbo.
It’s still a bit of a problem today, but Levitz manages to write his way around it.
Because A) this is not actually Orion but a copy B) Darkseid doesn’t even know if he HAS been defeated centuries earlier. So the prophecy might still be right even if Darkseid is still around.
McGuffin Grandpa Highfather is still too weak to take on Darkseid alone, but he heals the Legionnaires and provides a further gift…
…give Superboy and Supergirl the ability to keep their powers under a red sun for a while!
Superboy is hit first. I guess he’s not put into a coma like Mon-El thanks to Highfather powering him up.
Also Darkseid is sexist! I’m starting to think he might not be a good person.
One of the most BADASS Supergirl moments ever.
But as I said, it’s never good to have Darkseid’s attention.
But she’s not alone, because now the Legion is ready to take on Darkseid once and for all.
And appropriately enough, they don’t defeat him with brute strength…
…but because they have rallied all the 30th century heroes, together with THREE BILLION DAXAMITES, to get some payback!!!
That is so AWESOME that it took me YEARS to notice this is a huge plot hole: Apokolips is currently around a red sun, meaning the Daxamites should be powerless!!!
You can probably work around it by thinking Highfather grants them to keep their powers like he did with Superboy and Supergirl… but it’s not explicitly stated, and it feels a bit much.
Personally I would’ve gone with Sun Boy generating enough yellow sunlight to power them for a while, or even R.J.Brande showing up with a newly created yellow star.
Still… Darkseid admits defeat!!!
Apokolips also vanishes (???), and to make things more confusing it’s around a yellow sun.
Wildfire’s gonna Wildfire this one, because of course.
Darkseid really leaves with a prophecy… or rather a curse… which will be addressed way later in the series.
And that’s it! We have two pages of epilogue. The first one is the membership change: Light Lass moves to the reserves, and White Witch deservedly joins the team.
And the second is kind of an epilogue to the Supergirl and Brainiac 5 non-relationship.
Legion significance: 10/10
Could it possibly be anything else? The Legion is still under the shadow of this story TO THIS DAY.
Silver Age-ness: 4/10
Highfather’s “gift” is at least a bit Silver Age.
Does it stand the test of time? 9/10
The final issue is really representative of the whole Great Darkness Saga. It’s not perfect and it has problems… but the Legion has RARELY been this epic, the stakes have never been so high, and with an appearance of so many characters this really does feel like a huge event.
It’s also a surprisingly choral story: while some individual Legionnaires get the spotlight for a few panels, this really is a story where the whole Legion of Super-Heroes is the protagonist.
We are legion
There are now 41 people who have been members. That’s exactly the same number of people who have been rejected so far.
22 active Legionnaires
7 reserve members
1 honorary member (Rond Vidar)
1 on sick leave (Matter-Eater Lad)
Bonus: this is the last issue in the retrospective where I’m using the high quality scans of the trade paperback. And from that paperback, we have some behind-the-scenes notes on the look of the Legionnaires!
Which include notes on the breast size of the girls, because while it’s not the 70s anymore the Legion is still a very horny team.
Shadow Lass will get this costume eventually. Curious to see her defined as the tallest girl, it never really came across in the artwork.
Another thing that is not apparent from the artwork is that Element Lad should have “slightly feminine” lines. Probably a reference to the fan theory that he’s gay.
By contrast Colossal Boy should be the handsomest guy. Interesting to see that his unique design for the boots does have some logic behind it.
Not much to say about the others, but I still dislike this costume for Blok.
Levitz was kind of fascinated with Dungeons & Dragons, which was about ten years old at the time of the Great Darkness Saga. I don’t know if he ever played it, but he shows the Legionnaires playing what must be 101st edition from time to time. I say this because he writes the White Witch as a first edition D&D magic-user. She has to prepare and memorize a limited number of spells ahead of time and has little facility to improvise in an unexpected situation. Once she casts a spell, she forgets it until she has a chance to re-memorize and prepare. That said, her spells can be incredibly powerful. D&D magic-users in early editions of the game worked in just this manner; a magic system taken whole-cloth from Jack Vance’s “Dying Earth” series, and therefore often referred to as “Vancian Magic.”
One of the little touches that I’ve always loved in this saga is that once Darkseid’s true identity was revealed last issue, the normally white space between the panels was invaded by darkness. With Darkseid’s surrender, the darkness recedes, and the white spaces are restored.
Epic end to the saga! So many epic descriptions and quotes in this issue! Darkseid at his best! And The Legion too!
Here we have the beginning of possibly the only subplot I despised in Levitz’s run. Light Lass quits the Legion because “It wrecks lives y’know”, breaks up with Timber Wolf when he refuses to quit with her, goes to live on a kibbutz on Winath for a while, then decides she has to return to the Legion (guess it’s not wrecking lives any more) then treats Timber Wolf like dirt for the rest of the run, as if it was his fault that she quit. It just made her look live a selfish, entitled, indecisive brat.
Amen to Light Lass portrayal. I NEVER to this day understand how Timber Wolf was at fault in this especially considering how it was written and then forgotten about by everyone else including Lightning Lad and Saturn Girl. Even in the 5YL storyline they had him admit he was wrong?
Fine they wanted to put her with Shrinking Violet but find a better way or a better story cause this wasn’t it.