1990s – Page 11 – Comics Archeology

The first full Legion story I ever read was LSH #289; I wouldn’t get the chance to read the rest of the pre-Crisis Legion until a full decade after that.
So when I read that Shrinking Violet has been replaced by an alien shapeshifter for some time, my first reaction was a drawing a parallel to something Marvel did: when on the pages of Fantastic Four, Alicia Masters was revealed to have been replaced by a shapeshifter for some time.
Of the two superficially similar twists, one of them is generally remembered fondly by readers and the other is generally despised.
So, with the hindsight of having read both… what’s the difference between the two events?
Or, in other words:

YERA vs LYJA: WHO DID WHAT BETTER?

WHAT YERA DID BETTER

#1: There were hints

Admittedly I don’t have definitive proof of this, but even if Levitz didn’t decide the switch happened at the start of the Great Darkness Saga, there were some hints dropped here and there.
She didn’t recognize Duplicate Boy and was acting suspicious around him, she strangely knew information the Legion wasn’t supposed to, and most damning of all she used the “Durlan Nerve-Cruncher” on Emerald Empress. I might have missed one or more additional clues.

#2: The length of the exchange was far more believable

We discover that Shrinking Violet has been replaced in Legion of Super-Heroes #304 from October 1983. The switch happened in issue 287, from May 1982. That’s a gap of a little more than a year, with 17 issues in between.
In contrast, Lyja is discovered in Fantastic Four #357 from August 1991, but she retroactively has been acting as Alicia since Fantastic Four #265 from January 1984.
That’s seven years, or NINETY-TWO ISSUES. And that’s not even counting every single time Alicia shows up in other comics!!!

#3: It was consistent

Shrinking Violet HAS thought balloons here and there after the switch, but never anything that retroactively contradicts anything.
By contrast, it’s ABUNDANTLY clear that Alicia was SUPPOSED to be Alicia until the reveal.

#4: Yera’s reveal doesn’t damage character growth

If you’re unfamiliar with 1980s Fantastic Four: when the Thing left the team at the end of Secret Wars, his blind girlfriend Alicia underwent MASSIVE character development.
She had been kind of a blank slate for nearly her entire history, but John Byrne (and to a lesser extent other writers who followed him) really turned her into a three-dimensional character while developing her romance with the Human Torch…

…which resulted in them getting married in Fantastic Four #300.

Now, while I was 100% on this, not every fan liked the idea. But even if you prefer Alicia being the Thing’s girlfriend, you have to admit this didn’t completely destroy her character.
And I wouldn’t necessarily be mad at her going back with the Thing, but Tom DeFalco took it WAY too far: the reset button was pressed SO hard that all the work done on Alicia’s character for, again, NINETY-TWO ISSUES, was completely thrown off the window!!!

#5: The effect on the replaced character

I haven’t covered this part in the reviews proper yet, but… once Shrinking Violet returns to form, she will be a rather different character. I know several Legion readers who consider the post-switcheroo Violet to be THE definitive interpretation of the character.
Alicia was instead simply replaced to her previous doormat self.

Without spoilers, but… just contrast the difference when the switched characters meet!!!

We don’t even get to see whatever discussion Lyja and Alicia have because we’re never shown the rest of the scene!!! How lame is that!?!?

#6: Yera is a full character right from the reveal

As soon as she’s a regular supporting character, Yera has a role to fulfill and a definite personality.

Lyja, on the other hand, is all over the place. First she’s believed dead, then she comes back as a supervillain who hates the Torch, then she loves him again, then she becomes a de facto member of the Fantastic Four, then it turns out she’s still deceiving the Human Torch in many ways… the endless, and I do mean ENDLESS melodrama was tiresome.

It’s a complete mess. Admittedly I did like Lyja here and there, especially when she was standing up to the Torch’s bulls##t.

Now, to be completely fair, I don’t think the Lyja reveal is entirely inferior. In fact:

WHAT LYJA DID BETTER

#1: The reveal scene was far superior

The reader finds out Shrinking Violet has been replaced by a shapeshifter in the B plot (perhaps even the C plot) of the previous issue, with little to no fanfare.

Lyja instead is revealed at the last page of the issue. Say what you want about how the switch was handled later… but the reveal itself? Yeah, Lyja’s has a fantastically more potent impact.