ACTION COMICS #293 (1962)
by Jerry Siegel & Curt Swan
Insanity alert: this is where we’re headed with this issue.
The cover reminds me that we are a few issues away from the Legion stealing the title from Superboy.
Clearly they are preparing for the hostile takeover.
We start with a very rare scene of Clark Kent helping his father at the store.
Having more scenes like this would’ve made him a little more human.
That was a nice touch. But we can’t forget that Silver Age Lana Lang is insanely paranoid and this somehow makes her suspect that he’s Superboy once again.
We have seen in previous issues that Superboy is contacted by the Legion by blinking action figures. But how does anyone else contact him?
By a blinking lamp.
What is it with Superboy and blinking signals!?
The emergency is a plane losing altitude. But when Superboy reaches it, he suddenly decides to wreck it instead of saving it!
Luckily, Krypto saves the day.
By the way, Superboy knew of the accident because he was warned by the blinking lamp, but Krypto gets there on his own.
Are we SURE Smallville needs Superboy? Krypto seems to be all they really need.
And is it just me, or Superboy is acting slightly out of character?
This is the saddest picture involving Krypto we have ever seen.
And we once saw him almost dying of radiation poisoning!
Jokes aside, Superboy is appropriately scared by his sudden mood swings.
In another nice touch that we should’ve seen far more often, the Kents are really worried about him.
They usually don’t seem to give a crap about whatever happens to him (in their defense, he’s invulnerable).
Apparently, Clark ditched the action figures, because the Legion contacts him with same lamp trick.
Knowing Silver Age Clark, he probably threw away the action figures fearing they would somehow expose his secret identity.
The Legionnaires arrive at “the place they usually meet”, which is apparently the Gobi Desert.
Note that Superboy identifies their time machine as their “Time-Cabinet”; it doesn’t have an official name, but it will typically be called Time-Bubble in the future (pun intended).
The other device is an Intra-Dimensional Lens ™ that allows them to look into the Phantom Zone.
They want Superboy to identify the criminals inside it.
Which looks like it shouldn’t make any sense, since they are from a thousand years from the future… but it checks out: the phantoms don’t age so they are still inside the Phantom Zone in the future, and it WOULD be difficult to identify them since their planet exploded a thousand years earlier.
We also have a cameo from General Zod himself. An EXTREMELY rare thing in the Silver Age.
And even more surprising appearance: Mon-El, who was exiled to an eternity of suffering saved by Superboy the last time we met him.
It turns out Mon-El isn’t just here to say hello, but to save Superboy’s life: the Legion was just about to release the Phantom Zone criminals into the 20th century!
Okay, so “Plan A” was unleashing an army of Kryptonians to kill Superboy. Risky, but a logical plan when you don’t have the means to hurt him in other ways.
What’s “Plan B” then?
KILL HIM WITH KRYPTONITE.
OH COME ON! If you have rings that shoot Kryptonite, why wouldn’t THAT be Plan A!?!?
At least the cover image is featured in the story, for once.
In response, Superboy unleashes his robotic army.
It doesn’t work.
I believe this is the first indication of Cosmic Boy being one of the team’s powerhouses.
With Superboy down, the real enemies shows up.
I believe they’re from an episode of Futurama.
It’s actually crazier: their plan is to STEAL EARTH FOR THEMSELVES and move it to a different solar system, one with a purple star.
Incidentally, purple stars don’t exist.
But neither do floating brains and flying dogs that shoot lasers, so what do I know.
The full plan of the brains, however, was:
Hold on. Let me see if I get it.
Since their goal is to get rid of Superboy, THIS was their full plan:
1) summon the Legion from the future
2) brainwash them into attacking Superboy
3) give them Kryptonite rings that could kill Superboy
4) order the Legion NOT to use the rings to kill Superboy
5) summon the Phantom Zone prisoners
6) make THEM kill Superboy
It doesn’t work thanks to Mon-El, but if it worked, the result would be an unspecified number of uncontrollable Phantom Zone Kryptonians opposing the brains, possibly leading to:
7) have the brainwashed Legion kill the Phantom Zone Kryptonians with the rings
Sounds legit.
What do you think, Unimpressed Saturn Girl?
Yeah, this plan sucks.
By the way, their attempt to control Superboy was what made him go crazy at the beginning of the issue, so we should be at Plan C by now.
But the Legion finds a flaw in the enemy’s plan (well, ANOTHER one): they can’t control super-animals.
Kind of a stretch, isn’t it? They stop controlling the Legionnaires because keeping Superboy paralyzed takes all of their power (even with the effect of the Kryptonite).
Maybe they can’t control anyone else while they’re paralyzing Superboy, or maybe they can’t control two Kryptonians at once, or maybe I should stop looking for logic in a Silver Age story.
No, the solution is to look for super-animals across time and space!
So they travel to 20 years into Superboy’s future, which is Supergirl’s time, to get Streaky the Super-Cat.
And Beppo the Super-Monkey from Superbaby’s time.
And most importantly, they go into Supergirl’s future to get Comet the Super-Horse, in his first appearance!
So technically Comet debuts before his first appearance.
I’m sure that’ll be the weirdest thing about the super-horse. Aside from the fact that he almost became her boyfriend once.
(I’ll cover THAT story eventually, rest assured)
They all travel back to Superboy’s time, where we finally reach one of the best panels in comic book history.
Just take a moment to appreciate it.
A dog, a cat, a monkey and a horse, each with a cape, flying towards floating brains.
And yes, that is Lightning Lad RIDING ON A DOG’S BACK.
Granted: Comet was already taken, Lightning Lad can’t fly, and the Legion Flight Ring hasn’t been introduced yet. But Cosmic Boy has a jetpack!
Which can only mean one thing: Lightning Lad CHOSE to fly into battle riding Krypto.
The best part?
HE DOESN’T DO ANYTHING DURING THE FIGHT.
So… yeah. The super-animals saved the day.
And Lightning Lad got his wish to ride a flying dog.
As Lightning Lad and Cosmic Boy take the other super-animals to their time (on a second Time-Cabinet that wasn’t mentioned before), Saturn Girl stays behind to make sure they don’t break the space-time continuum.
Considering we’ve already seen that Krypto can time travel on his own, it’s probably too late.
Interestingly, her concern about Superboy learning that Supergirl will one day own a super-horse apparently comes BEFORE her concern about him learning of her existence.
There won’t be consequences, of course, when both Superboy AND Supergirl will interact with the Legion at the same time.
There are still a few panels, though, so there’s time for a little more insanity: the machine that was about to steal Earth was destroyed a little too late, so the Earth isn’t exactly in the right position.
A problem which Superboy solves BY MOVING THE EARTH WITH HIS BREATH.
That level of craziness can’t be topped. Unless…
Bonus Bizarro story!
Ah yes, Bizarro World, where nothing makes sense.
Even more so than in the regular Silver Age.
(since everything is backwards here, does it mean she’s saying the girl is wrong?)
It’s the typical random madness of a Bizarro story, until he gets arrested.
Which leads to him creating a duplicating machine and make Bizarro Luthor.
Which leads to them flying to Earth and go good deeds, because Bizarro Luthor is a good guy.
Although they are too stupid to really help anyone: they give a ton of diamonds to the guy who just lost all of his money, then his boat sinks due to the extra weight.
Meaning the guy lost all of his money AGAIN. And considering he tried to kill himself the first time (which was five minutes earlier), I don’t suppose we’ll ever see him again.
And since Bizarro Luthor wants to make a good deed for Superman, Bizarro decides to help him by making sure he won’t be bothered by his secret identity anymore… by exposing it to the world.
Okay, that was kind of funny.
Bizarro finally ends his troubles with the law by making new costumes for all Bizarros… with the S symbol properly backwards.
And the story finally ends with the dignity it deserves.
Historical significance: 4/10
The Legion of Super-Pets will return and Comet will make his proper appearance, but none of them will have a huge impact.
Legion significance: 3/10
If I remember correctly, the Legion of Super-Pets will be used exactly once again in a Legion story. It would be a lower score without the final scene with Saturn Girl, but it is the first time that preventing Superboy from learning about the future is a plot point.
Silver Age-ness: 8/10
Only SLIGHTLY lowered by the attention given to the time travel and the (very, very limited) attention to the human side of Superboy.
Does it stand the test of time? 4/10
If you like Silver Age silliness, it’s a blast. But a story like this only works in the Silver Age.
Other than that, the only slightly interesting part is the attention given to preserving the timeline.
We are legion
Just 3 active members plus Superboy.
Meaning the Legion of Super-Heroes and the Legion of Super-Pets are equally represented in the story.
How much Legion is too much?
The Legion of Superheroes currently consists of 15 people.
And of course, since this is a Superboy story…
Kryptonite, baby
OF COURSE they have Kryptonite rings!!!