Once again, the Legion has come back to the 21st Century. And once again, which Legion is it? Let's read Justice League United #5 & Annual #1

Justice League United #5

As I mentioned last week, I know nothing about the Justice League United series, so, once again, if I'm asking a bunch of silly questions, please be patient with me.

We begin with something I haven't seen in a long, long time. The first page is a recap of the first four issues of the series so we know who's on the team and what they've been up to. The members: The Martian Manhunter, Stargirl, Green Arrow, Animal Man, Adam Strange, Supergirl, and Hawkman. We also get a couple of villains, Byth, who I remember from that amazing Tim Truman Hawkworld mini-series, and Lobo. Because, of course, you always put Lobo in everything.

Hawkman died, which isn't a shock in the slightest, and continues the time-honored tradition at DC to treat the character as disposable. They also have a powerful child named Ultra, who they have to protect and watch over.

"The Midayo and the Whitago" is written by Jeff Lemire, pencilled by Timothy Green II, and inked by Joe Silver. I know nothing about Green's work, but judging by the first couple of pages, it looks like he's really good at drawing incredibly skinny women and characters who pose unnaturally.

We meet Miiyahbin and Heather, two people who a woman beside them claims fought the Abominable Snowman. But Mii interrupts, saying that it was worse - it was the Whitago.

I'm assuming this is something like the Wendigo, but they can't use that because it's so heavily tied to Marvel lore.

Also, I have no idea who this strangely-garbed woman is who's introducing the story. She's human, with short, black hair, and and I think she might be Adam Strange's wife, Alanna, but they don't identify her so I'm completely guessing.

Mii continues, saying that Whitagos are monsters who used to be people and are used as bogeymen for the people of Canada's north. But Mii blasted it away while wearing her own costume. She's Equinox, of course, and we've already seen her in Futures End, so I'm not sure why they're trying to keep a mystery here.

Green Arrow's old JLA transmitter starts going off, even though the team disbanded, and he realizes that it's Hawkman's transmitter that's been tripped. Also, just to clarify, I'm not sure if this is Oliver Queen or not. Or if it is, he's much younger than I remember. That means nothing, of course, since this is the New 52 and everything different... kinda...

J'onn wants to investigate this mystery, so they're headed back into space. Since they let the Thanagarians take Hawkman's body, they are worried something bad has happened. He then tells Alanna (yay, I was right!) to question Mii's grandmother and that she's in the Justice League. J'onn also wants Green Arrow to lead the team to investigate Hawkman's transmitter but they wonder how they're going to get into space.

Which is when Adam and Sardath appear on a video display and say they can hone in on Stargirl's staff and use the Zeta Beam to transport them to Hawkman's location. Which they do, zapping Stargirl, Supergirl, Animal Man, and Green Arrow. But not before GA calls Buddy, "Fish breath." Does that make sense? For Aquaman, yes. But for Animal Man? I mean, yes, fish are animals. But this seems like a bad attempt at... comedy?? Also, Animal Man should be, judging by the art, at least 10 years older than Oliver and probably more experienced at being a super-hero.

However, you could tell me that they're the same age and the artist just doesn't know how to draw and I'd buy that as well. 

J'onn stays behind to take care of Ultra while Alanna takes Mii and Heather to investigate the Whitago. 

The quartet suddenly appears in the Polaris Star System and we get, and I'm so happy to see this, an Encyclopedia Galactica entry to let us know where we are. They're on a space station that looks like it's covered in filth and they see a sign that says "Block-C20" with graffiti underneath that reads, "Professionals Only."

We get this line from Animal Man which confirms to me that this is not the Buddy Baker I loved from Grant Morrison's run:

    "'Professionals only.' What is this place, some kind of intergalactic brothel?"

How and why would he make that leap? Does he just assume anyone who's a professional should be a prostitute? If so, what has Buddy been doing in his spare time? 

Supergirl scans inside to see what's waiting for them and we soon learn it's full of bounty hunters. They're all armed, they all look like they're ready to fight, and I wonder how she knows they're bounty hunters and not criminals. Is there a sign? A card? Some sort of ID?

We then head to Moose Factory, Canada, home of the Moose Cree First Nation. Yes, this is a real place. It's on an island in the Moose River. It's served by Moosonee Airport. Which is part of the town on Moosonee. I think I'm just enjoying typing "Moose" over and over again.

Since Heather has no reason to stay in the story, they send her home with a hug from Mii and then go and see Mii's Gohkum, or grandmother. Since no one ever believes someone with a story about a Whitago, Mii has to change into Equinox and, apparently, does so with a magic word: "Keewahtin."

Her Gohkum is not surprised that she's a super-hero, telling her that that it's Mii's destiny and legacy. Then they both say the magic word together and they cross over to the mystical place where their power comes from. I write their because her Gohkum is a super-hero as well.

We get a great speech of how they're the protectors of their land, the Midayos, and their ancestors have been doing this since the beginning of things. We learn that their powers come from the seven pillars of Cree life: "love, humility, bravery, truth, respect, wisdom, and honesty." And the villains, the forces that bring about things like the Whitago, come from "dominion, control, aggression, deception, greed, selfishness, and fear."

So Equinox is basically the Cree version of Captain Marvel?

We learn that Mii's father was lost when the darkness affected him. He became the Whitago. Just once, just once, I would like to see a new super-hero who doesn't have to face off against a family member.

Equinox's powers change, depending on the season, which is a twist I really like. And since it's winter, the snow and ice flow through her. We get a little more exposition before they magically reappear and Alanna, who is supposed to look shocked, just looks like a badly-posed action figure. Like, seriously, has the artist never seen how real people stand before?

Oh, and to save on explaining anything, Alanna acts like she was there for the whole explanation. No idea how... or why... but she immediately understands everything. 

The pair fly off to locate the Whitago (luckily Alanna is wearing a rocket backpack) and they head into a cave to face the villain. We also have a great moment where the dialogue balloon is pointed at the wrong person, which I always love to see.

The Whitago attacks, disarming Alanna, and we get the showdown between father and daughter. Mii wants to help her father and she wants to take the darkness from him.

One panel later, he's returned to human form and is apologizing. And then he just disappears into smoke. He joins the rest of the fallen Midayos and then they all disappear.

Three pages - that's it. They completely wrap this whole thing up in three pages. I know that I complain about decompression, and this is obviously the opposite, but I would've liked this to be a little bit harder for Equinox.

She and Alanna talk about how they're both doing well, and they feel like they know who they are, and Alanna says something that makes me confused:

    "A couple of weeks ago I was a grad student at U of T, now I have a jet pack and a ray gun."

So she's not from Rann? Is she still married to Adam? Were they married and they discovered the Zeta Beam together? Is she no longer Sardath's daughter? Why make those changes? Does this make the characters any more interesting then they were before?

Anyway, they both decide to be heroes, and members of the Justice League, and wonder if they'll ever get to meet Wonder Woman.

Let's go back to the Justice League bunker, which is located in Moosonee, and which means that Justice League literally looked at a tiny community in northern Canada (Ontario, actually, and I have no idea why that isn't mentioned) and thought, "let's build a military-style bunker here." Oh, and the Canadian government didn't have something to say about that?

Anyway, Ultra has started speaking and we learn that someone is coming to hurt the alien child. And that time is broken. Just as Alanna and Equinox return, the ceiling collapses and...

Mon-El has arrived. He tells them he's "travelled across space and time -- from the thirty-first century -- just to find" Ultra. And he must destroy the child... "or the Legion of Super-Heroes will die!"

This leads into Annual #1, part one of "The Infinitus Saga!"

Ignoring the fact that I don't know which Green Arrow this is, or why Alanna's origin has been changed so much, I kinda enjoyed this issue. It's definitely better than last week's Futures End stories.

My biggest complaint is the artwork. I just wish Green had studied basic anatomy or looked at live models to figure out how people actually stand. His aliens were cool-looking, but that's about the nicest thing I can say here.

 

Justice League United Annual #1

What a fascinating choice of Legionnaires for the cover! Does this mean Phantom Girl is back from her own dimension? Does this mean they completely ignored how the Legion book ended? Is this Earth 1 or Earth 2?

We pick up exactly where we left off, with Mon-El wanting to kill Ultra the Multi-Alien. Did I know that was his name before? Nope. But since they finally decided to add captions explaining who everyone is, I got that info.

And Alanna is a Strange, so I guess they're married and both human. Okay... 

It's "The Infinitus Saga Part 1 of 5" written by Jeff Lemire, pencils by Neil Edwards, and inks by Jay Leisten. I know I complained about anatomy last issue, but this is what we're dealing with here:
 

Can I assume that J'onn is changing the shape of his right arm to fight Mon-El? But where did his elbow go? And does Mon-El have a spine?

We're completely ignoring the Legion Lost issue where J'onn met Legionnaires, because he says he has no clue who the Legion of Super-Heroes are and he needs Mon-El to stand down. The battle continues and then, to make things more interesting, Alanna is suddenly zapped by a Zeta beam and Alan Strange takes her place.

Everyone keeps fighting and Equinox freezes Mon-El, giving them enough time so she can let Adam know that the others are in space looking into what happened to Hawkman... which Adam should already know because he was there in issue #5 when Sardath sent them to the space station. Didn't Lemire write both issues? Shouldn't he know this?

Speaking of Polaris, let's head to the Plexus-6 Pleasure Station, which is where the other members of the team are currently facing off against a bunch of bounty hunters. And wow, it is a brothel. How did Animal Man know that so quickly? Is there something he's not telling his wife?

My first, and most obvious, question. Why would the bounty hunters care about these Justice Leaguers?

My second question is what other changes have they made to Oliver Queen? According to the bio, he's a "billionaire playboy turned expert archer." But he still looks like he's 20.

He tries to get Supergirl to stand down, but she just flies in and attacks the bounty hunters. Is there a reason for this? Am I missing something about her back story? Or does she just like fighting aliens when she doesn't have to?

Supergirl grabs the alien who's holding Hawkman's transmitter and threatens him to get the information. She quickly finds out that the body wasn't sent to Thanagar, it was brought to one of the moons, a place called Ryngor. There's a cult on that moon and the priest? Of course it's Byth. Yeah, I'd pretty much tell a threatening Supergirl anything she wanted to know too.

Oh, and I hate Supergirl's costume. Just bizarre color choices...

Back on Earth, Adam Strange is replaced by Alanna and Mon-El, who is trying to plead his case, is confused. So J'onn sucker-punches him. He attempts to make a telepathic connection and other Legionnaires finally arrive.

We have no Time Bubble so they just appear in pink energy. It's Saturn Girl, looking remarkably like the version of her who was in Legion of 3 Worlds, Brainiac 5, and Phantom Girl. The three prefer a diplomatic solution and, after Mon-El wakes up, Brainy offers to show them what's going on.

Is that what we're doing here? Just ignoring everything that's happened after Legion of 3 Worlds? 

He explains that they did, actually, use Time Bubbles and that they're from a super-team in the future: The Legion! There's a mosh of costumes here so I honestly have no idea when this image is supposed to have happened. Blok's wearing brown shorts. Polar Boy still has his ice arm. And apparently the future is a Lego city. I'm assuming that the artist just read the Action Comics story, drawn by Gary Frank, and used that as his only reference.

According to Brainy, in the future, in the the Polaris system, a being called Infinitus appeared through a space-time rift and started absorbing planets. Within hours, Thanagar and Psion were gone. Judging from the design and name, I'm guessing Infinitus came from the Marvel universe. Man, this is so close to copyright infringement, it's scary.

Brainiac 5 says:

"I sent a battle squad of our most powerful members -- Mon-El, Star Boy, Phantom Girl, Element Lad, White Witch, Lightning Lad and Shadow Lass."

Hmmm... I don't mean to be a jerk, but if Phantom Girl is one of the most powerful Legionnaires, what happened to Wildfire? Or Ultra Boy, who's drawn in the panel (unlike White Witch) but not shown?

They're trying to save Rann with a rescue team on the planet and they were able to slow Infinitus down. But he unleashed an army from within himself, called Infinity Wraiths, and they soon pushed the Legionnaires back. Hmmm... this kinda feels like the wraiths from Crisis, but I could just be looking for comparisons now.

Brainy mentions that there were casualties and they show Shadow Lass screaming in pain. She was wounded badly and the Legionnaires worked on saving her. Needless to say, Mon-El was just a little upset.

Brainy kept researching Infinitus, ignoring the fact that he looks like a new version of The Infinite Man, and determined that Ultra will grow up to become this villain.

Let's head back to the Leaguers trying to figure out what's going on with Hawkman's body. We get another Sardath info dump explaining how they're able to use Stargirl's staff to transport them all over the galaxy using Zeta Beam tech, and then Animal Man makes a request. Can he call home?

Before we get to some Baker family conversations, Green Arrow challenges Supergirl, telling her that since he's in charge of this away team, she needs to follow his orders. Since her attack lead to them discovering where Hawkman was taken, she figures she's right for doing what she wanted to and ignoring things like safety and teamwork.

Back to Buddy and Ellen. I know that Lemire is trying to make this comedic relief, especially the bits where he says he's late and she's upset that he's in space... again... But it's just not working. It's played as so nonchalant and unimportant that you wonder why they'd waste a page on it.

We haven't had a fight scene in a while, so Byth returns and grabs Supergirl and Green Arrow. She uses her heat vision to burn through his tentacles and he drops Oliver as well. They demand the body be returned to them and Byth makes the next shocking reveal:

Hawkman's alive again and ready to kill the Justice League. And he's attacking the Justice League.

So we go back to Earth, because that's what you do when you make a big reveal.

Mon-El still wants to kill Ultra because he thinks Shadow Lass is dead. But the other Legionnaires let him know that she's just in a coma and she's going to recover. He calms down a bit and Alanna asks "This Shadow Lass... is she your...?" I guess her super power isn't one of observation.

Mon-El says yes, so we have even more proof that this isn't the Legion we saw in the previous series.

Brainy finally makes J'onn his offer, and you'll all love this:

    "When we left the 31st Century Infinitus was still thirty-six hours from Earth. So I will allow us twenty-four hours to work together to determine exactly how Ultra becomes Infinitus and prevent it."

And if they don't? The rest of the Legion will follow them to the 21st Century to "destroy the child at any cost."

It's... a... Time... Bubble... They can return to the future at any time. They can literally return a second after they leave. This 24 hour restriction makes no sense. Of course, if they were really thinking, the Legionnaires would have gone back in time to when Ultra was still a baby, and not protected by the Justice League, and destroyed him then.

Oh, and finally, I guess we're just completely ignoring the Legion code against killing, right?

Green Arrow suddenly appears in some weird video projection (I'm guessing they're just in constant contact with Rann and can do this now) and lets them know Byth is back and he wants Ultra. Oh, and Hawkman is still alive.

At that moment, Hawkman slams his mace into Green Arrow's face and we'll just ignore that Oliver is a normal human being. They yell at each other, Arrow notches a... well... an arrow, and the League is fighting a dinosaur??

Yes, it's obviously Byth who shape-changed into a dinosaur, but he's also talking about time looping and how this fight has happened before. Supergirl punches him, forcing him back into the form of man, and we find out he's "the usher of the true new universe... the one that will consume all!" He's the high priest of the Church of the Infinite. He keeps gloating and bragging so she punches him again.

Byth says that the messiah must be brought here and that is Ultra. Byth also claims to have created Ultra and he is going to be the vessel. Supergirl points out that Ultra's on Earth, but Byth tells her that he's got a team of his best agents there as well.

And we see that we have some more generic bad guys in the frozen tundra of Canada.

Everyone's shaking, from Moosonen to Ryngor and the Leaguers and Legionnaires fly towards... something.

A huge purple rip in space-time appears above the Thanagarian moon just as the new villains appear before our heroes on Earth. Who emerges from the tear? Why it's Infinitus, of course. Or it's his image... I think...

Most definitely to be continued.

Well that was definitely a comic book, wasn't it?

Once again, time travel causes problems and I'm just going to assume that Infinitus is going to appear in both time periods and nothing will make sense if you think about it for more than a few minutes.

On the positive side, I did enjoy seeing the Legionnaires again and Lemire did a pretty good job handling them. Mon-El flying on the handle and attacking because Shady was hurt reminded me of the good old days, so that was a bit of a comfort.

But... and this is a heavy but... if this story is going to completely ignore everything that happened in Legion Lost or Legion volume 7, then what's the point of DC even contemplating continuity anymore? Whether you like the continuity or not, both DC and Marvel have kinda made a promise to their readers that these stories matter. I may not have liked everything that's been happening since the Retroboot and New 52 started (and hated a lot of it), but if you're just going to magic wand it all away and restart again, then what's the point of buying a comic when it comes out?

It's DC saying these stories don't matter and then we're back to the 1970s.

Now won't I feel like an idiot when, next issue, there's a dramatic reunion between the Legion Lost Legionnaires and these four in northern Canada.

 

It's a big weekend for the Long Live the Legion podcast! We have two episodes for you to enjoy.

We take a look at Legion of Super-Heroes #3.

We talk about Character Assassination with author Barry Lyga.

Please take a listen to both of them and don't forget to like and subscribe!