Legion of Super-Heroes #312 (1984)
by Paul Levitz & Keith Giffen
Well, I always knew the Science Police would one day get mad at me for making fun of their hats and helmets.
We begin with Science Police officer Gigi Cusimano flirting with a Legionnaire. You’d expect her passion for old books would mean she’d hit on Cosmic Boy, but nope, apparently it works on Sun Boy even better.
Gigi has barely made any impression when compared to her fellow officer Shvaughn Erin, so this is some much-needed development.
Also this makes me wonder: did we ever learn when Interlac was invented? Post-Crisis there’s plenty of evidence it’s FAR older than the 30th century, but I’m not so sure in this continuity.
Now don’t be shocked, but Sun Boy is not particularly interested in the books themselves.
Their totally-not-a-date is interrupted by an emergency.
The emergency is an explosion in a nearby stadium. Colossal Boy is already there, but I don’t think his power is the best to calm the crowd.
Element Lad is definitely more useful. This is the period where he starts to transmute stuff into Inertron (or “Inerton” apparently) all the time.
The Science Police suspected the stadium could get attacked, much to Element Lad’s surprise.
And WOW is Giffen going overboard with those facial expressions.
Erin’s excuse does make a little sense…
…but yeah, it’s still a clear sign something went wrong.
When the Legionnaires reach the Science Police headquarters, there’s a cool bit of worldbuilding: we see the results of the scans of the Legionnaires.
You can see their Legion icon on the upper left, they’re identified as male in the upper right, and there’s a slight description of how they were identified. Interesting that Sun Boy emits “high background radiation”.
We also see how the human Science Police officers are identified. On the upper left there’s what I assume is their rank, on the upper right their gender (notice Shvaughn is identified as female, that’ll be important waaaaaaaay later). And on the bottom, instead of the Legion symbol, you can see “SP” written in Interlac.
Don’t expect me to notice too many Interlac trivia in the future, I’m terrible at reading that font.
Also my logo looks like crap in Interlac.
The Science Police has one of those computers that can never be wrong unless they’ve been tampered.
With the computer system unreliable, crimes have to be double checked by officers. And it’s an interesting little glimpse into the day-to-day life in the United Planets.
Wait, there’s only a hundred Science Police officers on Earth!? Like, on the whole planet? No wonder we barely ever see them be helpful to the Legion!!!
It’s fascinating that Earth is apparently such an utopia that the concepts of having thousands of cops sounds ridiculous to them.
Shaughn has brought two recruits into the investigation… except it’s just Element Lad and Colossal Boy in disguise, with Gigi immediately recognizing the latter.
The two share some history that’ll be talked about in future issues.
When the next explosion hits, Element Lad (still in disguise) calls other Legionnaires to help, because apparently one fire is too much for him…
…to the point of calling up Superboy! That sounds like overkill.
That was kind of random, but I do like the very unconventional solution to solve a cybercrime: witchcraft!
White Witch doesn’t QUITE identify the hacker, but she does manage to prove it’s a Science Police officer.
This gets the attention of the man behind the hack, who threatens to blow up the Science Police headquarters.
Don’t worry, White Witch is on the case!
Well… you might want to worry a little.
Thankfully it’s “just” the armory that gets damaged: Element Lad protects the Science Police officers with an Inetrtron dome, and the other Legionnaires handle the rest.
And that’s when we’re ending the main plot, because next time there’ll be the last target: the President, a.k.a. Colossal Boy’s mother.
In other plots, Shrinking Violet is finally cleared for duty. Which apparently she celebrates with some fanservice.
It’s also our first glimpse into her new costume.
Also Brainiac 5 still has the hots for Supergirl…
…and Invisible Kid’s sister is now fully cured.
I’ll be a looooong time before we see her again. I don’t know what plans Levitz had for her, but he probably did intend for her to develop powers.
And finally, Lightning Lad and Saturn Girl leave the active roster because she’s taking maternal leave.
Legion significance: 0/10
This two-parter is mostly fluff to close out Volume 2, before the series is relaunched with Volume 3 after next issue.
Silver Age-ness: 3/10
The computer talk is mostly from classic sci-fi tropes.
Does it stand the test of time? 7/10
Despite the explosions, this is one of the most chill Legion stories. To say nothing happens would be an exaggeration, but not by much. Giffen is also in his new style, of which I’m not a fan.
Still a solid story, but it’s abundantly clear this is a minor one.
We are legion
Moving Lightning Lad and Saturn Girl into the reserves.
20 active Legionnaires
8 reserve members
1 honorary member (Rond Vidar)
41 people have been members
Interesting letters: I’m glad I wasn’t the only one noticing Phantom Girl is turning a bit insufferable.
The Interlac characters are a bit of a pain to read, I agree, but I think only Zendak’s symbol includes an indicator of rank (it looks like a ‘Z’ with a star symbol next to it.) Shvaughn’s just looks like a stylized ‘S’ and Gi Gi’s looks like… “G G”.
My favorite Vi outfit, but it doesn’t shine until Lightle gets ahold of it, especially with the hairdo. Giffen here makes it a sackcloth. Lightle made it Runway-ready.