Legion Letters #6

I just have to say, this was amazing.

Both deaths were completely unexpected. The first, because I though that it was her who was death. The second one, well, although it seems obvious now, it wasn't until they had left him that it hit me.

Wonderful issue, action packed and emotive.

Also, the cover was awesome.

Wow. As this was the final issue of this run, I had to read it. Scott loves these characters, so I owed it to myself and him to dive head first into the book, just as Cos leapt into that building to save the life of the girl trapped inside. Wow. This was... Amazing.


SPOILERS!!!












Vidar, you... You bastard! Polar Boy! Noooo! Nice guy, shows a real growth in maturity and character and then WHAT?! Scott, you sonofagun! And then... And then... Nemesis Kid No. You did not do what you just did did you not? Hot damn, you did. You flew away. And Cos... Cos... You broke time

I love encouraging people to do the totally unexpected thing

Thank you Brian... all of your comments mean quite a lot to me.

I wish I could keep the book going, but at this point I just can't. I hope that when it returns you will be just as excited and floored!

Oh, and I want to kill Nemesis Kid. Slowly.

;D

I'm glad you feel that way! It shows that you care what happens to the characters... Nemesis Kid was one of those characters that really hasn't been seen since the 1980's when he killed the original Karate Kid... Well, KK actually killed himself trying to kill Nemesis Kid, but you know what I mean. I wanted him to be a viable threat again.

We know he's an S.O.B., let's hope the others find out before the body count is raised even higher!

We know he's an S.O.B., let's hope the others find out before the body count is raised even higher!

I have to utterly agree with that comment, because there's nothing that sucks the winds out of my sails more with comics than rampant death just to prove something is big, epic and earth-shaking.

Take care
Don

I did read it, and pretty much felt the story was okay. Standard, solid Legion adventuring, interesting character choices and uses.

And then the deaths.

It's tough to convince me that killing off interesting and fun characters is ever necessary. I don't believe in rampant death in comics, it's one of the things that prevents me from reading DC and Marvel these days, and I fail to see the "need" to kill the two off that you did.

It's clear from the second death that you have more in mind. That's fine. I'll wait and see. I have to wait and see, since you're done for the nonce, and we all have to wait for whatever special or mini you're planning next. But there were so many ways for him to avoid death without even putting thought into it that seriously, for me it ranked up with Hawkeye's death in Avengers Disassembled (or any of hte deaths in that storyline really): it "had" to happen in order ot make the story "tense, dramatic and startling".

This is just my opinion. I understand I'm in a rapidly diminishing minority on this kind of subject. I realize there are many who love to see this kind of thing. And that's fine. But for me, it's a real problem and something that turns me off. There are some titles where the rules apply differently. Suicide Squad comes to mind. Yes, characters should probably get gakked there with some more fequency.

Legion is about optimism and hope and a future where we've made it. It's also about fun and swashbuckling space adventure and bucking the odds and derring-do. This felt like none of that.

Things like this also help to limit the enthusiasm of (at least some) writers to want to put their spin on things in the future. Granted, it looks like Legion is locked into your firm grip, so I suppose that's not an issue in the case of Legion.

Anyway, it was going well. I was sorry to see how this issue, and series (only six issues in, too) wrapped up.

Take care
Don

I'm well aware of Legion's history. I've been reading the group for nigh on thirty years now, and loved them. I'm aware of the characters that have died over the years, but they've been stretched out over many, many years. Yes, Ferro Lad was written to die, but it was done in a time when it meant something and had impact.

I'm tired of dark comics, I'm tired of death at every turn, and so that's what turned me off here. You can tell me "wait adn see what's coming" but honestly...why? I'm also getting tired of being told "wait and see, wait and see" whenever I say something like "I was disappointed in A" or "B left me feeling let down" or "C wasn't to my taste". That has no effect on whether I'll like a tale in the future. I'm commenting on the one now. I know that the later issues of a title down the pike may be different. But the issues provided me are what I have to base my expectations on. Right now, a grim and gritty Legion is why I stopped reading Legion after DandA took over, with the Blight story on. It's not just you. You feel you might have had good reasons to kill the Legionnaires you did. But it's just more added to the body pile of carnage. You're not alone. You're not isolated. It's not an uncommon occurrence. It's just more death. And as mentioned, the second death I feel could have been easily diverted and prevented, and therefore, it happened because you wanted it to happen, for no other reason then you wanted two deaths.

It's just how I feel. Being told "wait and see" doesn't chagne anything about here and now, and being told a litany of Legionnaires killed in the past doens't make what happened here and now more palatable.

And Legion might not seem popular on the site, but on the other hand, Legion is one of two properties DC owns that I'm fiercely passionate about. Incredibly, ferociously passionate about. THere are two titles I want to write, and there are two I'd want to write in a DC fanfic universe like this one. One is Shazam, the other is Legion. So I'm admittedly and notoriously hard to please in those regards. I know what I want and like in Legion. For that, I apologize. Sadly, with DC2, neither of the titles appears to be an option, so I'll just read and critique Legion.

Take care
Don

After reading the election lineup, I noticed there were a lot of Legion members absent from all the issues up to this one. Is there a second title in the works?

As the guy who's known by some of the readers/writers/artists/editors (etc) on the site as the guy who sadistically takes his characters through hell, I'm going to chime in on this.

Scott is an amazing writer. That should be said. He can tell a story that pulls at your heart strings. His Green Lantern run was one of the most solid runs on the site, consistently well-written and up there with Brian's New Outsiders and Dave's original Wonder Woman run. Tight stuff indeed. If Scott does something, it's not some flippant thing. It's part of a story. It's part of a tapestry he's working on that will blow our minds.

The emotional impact of this issue was resounding. Nemesis Kid is going to take the LoSH to a dark place, you can tell, and if he's willing to let Cos die... COS, one third of the trinity of heroes that FORMED the LoSH in the first place, then we know he will go out of his way to do something that will make this event seem like child's play. Polar Boy, meh. He was a hero, but he wasn't in the same league of Cosmic Boy, but even his sacrifice for Saturn Girl was memorable.

I doubt people would CARE if ONLY Polar Boy died. Come on. He's Polar Boy. Legion of Substitute Heroes and all that. But with Cos, ooooh, Scott, you're a bastard! You're like Didio! You shouldn't be allowed to write books!

Rubbish.

If you don't like a book, don't read it. Don, you seem to have made up your mind on this. But if you have faith in a writer, like I do when it comes to Mr K, then you'd stick around. You've not known Scott as long as I have, or read his stuff for as long as I have, but I know that Scott is great at what he's doing. And what he's doing, like he said, is doing something different. I don't want to read a story of a team just running about winning. What's the point? That's why they're here. To win. But it gets boring after a while. Superman is unbeatable. But stories where he's taken down a notch, where he's actually defeated in the first act, those have more resonance than the stories where he just freezes the villain and goes home to have some beef bourgoin with ketchup. Where's the impact? The emotion? Nowhere.

That's my opinion. I know people disagree with me.

This was an awesome issue. Don, I know you have problems with some decisions the DC2 editorial team has made (regarding Shazam! I somewhat agree! It's like... Eww. Incesty.) but LoSH is a book deserving of a commitment. Disagree with me. I know you probably will. And I don't mind.

I accept your opinion, but that doesn't mean I agree with it. This story distilled sacrifice and heroism into a story that is deserving of a wider readership.

I like what Didio has done with DC recently. There's a sense of urgency to that universe now. I know that people still moan about the death of Sue Dibny, but honestly, look at where the world has gone since then? How many stories have been borne out of that one event? Civil War? Joe Q can bite me. And doesn't it show Sue's strength of character that she didn't let her rape at the hands of Doctor Light affect her all those years afterwards? I never thought about that before. Hmm. Though I still wished Hawkman shoved his mace up that dude's face. Hmm indeed.

Now, I realize that that was one hell of a rant, but anyone who can tell me how many characters I've killed on the site (not including the Question) would be a helpful person indeed.

Wow, kinda speechless right now.

Thanks Chuck!

Sorry I took so long to read this...delaying the inevitable end of the series, I guess.

I'll admit, I was surprised to see Cos die, but he didn't exactly go out like a wuss, did he? Kinda reminded me of the death of Chewbacca (now THAT pissed me off!), but we do have that saving grace at the end. Y'know, that mysterious guy who said time was broken...maybe he can trap some of that broken time and fix things up...I believe it would be in his own personal interest to do so, at least in one reality...(okay, I'm out of sly references) ;D

The story on a whole was making my head spin -- too much to keep track of! -- but when it cooked, it cooked real good, my man. Looking forward to the minis or one-shots or what-have-you down the line. In the meantime, I'll keep my flight ring extra-shiny. =(L)=

"In a flash of light, a hero falls." Y'all either gotta get them universal translators fixed or start paying me. ;D And glad you liked the ring emoticon, it was a spur-of-the-moment idea. And of course, you had to go and improve it with the glowy-thing.