Saturday, December 31, 2011

Week of 16 November 2011

LEGION OF SUPER-HEROES 3 (2012/01)
"Shadow War"
ROLL CALL:

Brainiac 5, Chameleon Boy, Chemical Kid, Comet Queen, Cosmic Boy, Dragonwing, Element Lad, Glorith, Invisible Kid (Jacques), Lightning Lass, Mon-El, Phantom Girl, Polar Boy, Shadow lass, Shrinking Violet, Sun Boy, Ultra Boy, Dominators, Res-Vir

CUTE BOYS:
Brainy, Brek, Dirk, Hadru, Jacques, Jan, Jo, Lar, Rokk

An action-packed issue that advances the storyline on several fronts.

On Panoptes, the Legion team is facing both Res-Vir the renegade Daxamite and an invasion fleet of Dominators. The older Legionnaires take it in stride, but Dragonwing and particularly Chemical Kid seem a little out of their depth.

Brainy experiments on Glorith, testing the young witch's force shield. He is unconcerned about the Panoptes situation.

A team consisting of Cosmic Boy, Invisible Kid, Lightning Lass, and Shrinking Violet goes to Daxam in search of info about Res-Vir.

Above Panoptes, the Legionnaires (with reinforcements) make mincemeat of the Dominators fleet. on the surface, Mon-El and Ultra Boy, with the help of Shadow Lass, keep Res-Vir busy while Element Lad tries to figure out how to neutralize Res-Vir's anti-lead serum. Cham disguises himself as a Dominator and slips aboard the command ship.

Element ad consults with Brainy, who is on the point of figuring out the best way to subdue Res-Vir, when Shady's darkness clears to reveal that Mon-El has already knocked Res-Vir unconscious. The issue ends with Mon saying "I'm a little more used to action in shadow" and Brainy replying, "A wise man knows when not to comment, my friend."

BITS OF LEGIONNAIRE BUSINESS:

Upon landing on Daxam the Legion cruiser is sealed off to prevent heavy metal contamination. Dialogue makes it clear that (a) Daxam's quarantine is there to protect the Daxamites, (b) Daxam is still a peaceful world with no interest in conquest, and (c) Res-Vir was somehow spirited offword without a trace.

Res-Vir's anti-lead serum doesn't use Kryptonite, like the one Brainy invented -- it uses "something else -- something unnatural."

Shadow Lass collapses when she lowers her darkfield, but seems to recover quickly. Some on the web have speculated that perhaps Shady is pregnant. I don't know...but certainly something's going on with her, perhaps going as far back as her breakup with Mon and her subsequent affair with Earth Man. That last exchange isn't just a clever double-entendre meant to reveal character...Levitz is undoubtedly reminding us that Mon and Shady had a romantic past. I'll bet there's more to come....

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