LEGION OF SUPERHEROES #1
Written by Paul Levitz
Drawn by Francis Portela
Review by Brad Jones
If you’ve read my takes on Teen Titans #1 or Legion Lost #1, you’ll know how I feel about this book. It’s a fair bit of drivel to me. Whereas Teen Titans takes it’s time introducing you to only a few of the characters who will eventually comprise this team, nearly every panel of Legion is overloaded with little introductory bubbles of about a bajillion different heroes, none of whom you’ll remember nor care anything about after 20 pages. It’s as if we’re shown every single mutant ever associated with the X-Men in one book and expected to know everything that’s going on. Legion of Superheroes, like Legion Lost, rely on previous knowledge of these characters, and while it may show my ignorance of these heroes, I do NOT know them, and this book hasn’t changed my mind.
Legion takes place in the world that the characters of Legion Lost have left behind. It’s as if the Justice League disappeared and left the fighting to the Teen Titans. The idea is fine, but I don’t know or care about any of these peeps.
The art is alright, but after seeing some of the efforts of Justice League, Teen Titans and Detective Comics, I can’t help but feel like the number of characters and set pieces have bogged down the stylistic direction of the book and dragged it into mediocrity.
WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW
Clearly, more than what we’re told. I imagine that if you’re familiar with the Legion of Superheroes, you may enjoy this offering, but if you’re new to it, as I am, there may be little to grab onto.
VERDICT
Skip It – Like Legion Lost, this book doesn’t care if you know little of this universe. So I, in turn, care little for it.
