The Hottest Mess II

Continued from last weekend, here's the fallout from The Legion of Superheroes 50 (1988), in which a foursome led by Brainiac confronted the Time Trapper at the very end of existence. During said conflict, the Legion were savagely drubbed by the being embodying entropy itself; Duo Damsel's second persona died, and the nigh-invincible Mon El took a roasting by the cosmic energies in play. But before the Trapper could maim Brainiac and Saturn Girl, the super-intelligent Coluan unleashed the Infinite Man, a secret weapon in the form of a hero who embodied a circuitous universe.

"Thank you," said the Infinite Man to Brainiac, while destroying the Trapper's time barrier. "For this, I forgive you for my birth and damnation... farewell..."  But "The Trial of Brainiac Five" has nothing to do with the Trapper's defeat. It deals instead with the supposed murder of Jaxon Rugarth, the comatose professor in whose body the Infinite Man dwelt.

With most of the Legion members watching on monitors throughout headquarters, Brek Banin, the sanctimonious Polar Boy, accuses Brainiac of violating the team's constitution by needlessly sacrificing a life. In objection, Saturn Girl says, "I helped write that clause... don't preach it to me. Your interpretation is extreme." She goes on to state that Rugarth wasn't a sentient being, and so couldn't have been murdered. Blok and Quislet, non-human members of the Legion, are duly impressed by the unfolding argument.

Artist Keith Giffen, throughout most of this Legion run, included a specific close-up panel on ninety percent of his pages. It's a slanted shot of the speaker's mouth, nose and eye, with maximal emotion conveyed. He typically reserved it for the best dialogue on the page, allowing us to peer straight into a character's soul. Occasionally, when Giffen sketches the layout for another artist, these panels are his thumbprint (1988's Justice League, drawn by Kevin Maguire, is a good example).

This late 80s Legion is also remarkable for ditching the narration boxes that writers lean on for tone, pacing and exposition. Paul Levitz uses them only to set new scenes. Everything else comes through dialogue that is flirty, feisty and engagingly adult. To Polar Boy's contention that a cure for Rugarth's vegetative state might have some day been found, Brainiac spouts a page-long diatribe that reads like prime-time television scripting: "Fellow Legionnaires, I offer no defense against the charge of murder... not because I choose to plead guilty. But because this trial itself is irrelevant."

Polar Boy thinks he's insane, and Saturn Girl wants to throttle him. Still, Brainiac continues, "This is a simple matter of morality. I believe that what I did to Professor Jaxon Rugarth was within the bounds of the course he himself would have chosen for his life, if he could." That readers saw the Infinite Man thank Brainiac doesn't matter. Whether we agree with him doesn't matter. The compelling aspect here is that, as a twelfth-level intellect from Colu, Brainiac knows himself to be indispensable to the Legion. His moral high-ground is a luxury. His behavior both serves as a bright example and sets a dangerous precedent to others who might see their constitution as just a piece of paper. Or so it seems.

A quick note further about the art, before I flit away: a friend once called Carl Gafford's sublime coloring of this Legion run "lollipops." I can't really improve that description, except to say that most 80s comics, from the purchase date onward, were hideously washed out and black ink smeared. Giffen's emphasis on broad panels and open, youthful faces, allows for heavy blocks of color. These issues, printed on superior Baxter paper, have never been cleaned up and collected into a trade. The original care in producing them, however, helps sustain a corner of comics that's its own pastel wonderland.

But candy alone can't bring asses back to the same seats, year in, year out. The protein here comes when the almost thirty-strong Legion votes Brainiac innocent. Soul-weary from the endless arguing about what their constitution does or doesn't mean, he responds by quitting. On his way out, he gives Luornu Durgo (the former Duo Damsel, who lost half of herself to the Time Trapper) his force-field belt. He then leaves the team to their childish bickering, disappointed in their lack of moral autonomy from a document they themselves created. Your blogger, living in today's United States, could not applaud him more.

The Hottest Mess

Their golden flight rings held high since the late 1950s, DC's Legion of Superheroes is one of comics' most endearingly dense sagas. Taking place one thousand years in the Justice League's future, the Legion has never been as popular as Superman and his bench of icons. Nor has the Legion, made up in most of their iterations by teenagers, ever seen the limelight shined on the Teen Titans (comprised mainly of sidekicks).

These interplanetary heroes, whether you read them as The Legion (2001), The Legionnaires (1993), or as Superboy's pals in Adventure Comics (1958), have retained a fiercely loyal following rivaled perhaps only by the X-Men. This probably has to do with there being thirty plus members, each hailing from a different world in the galactic governing body called the United Planets. Some have blue skin, while some are giant methane-breathing fish. All have incredible powers that make life in the 30th Century more interesting.

The story-by-story mechanics of dedicated Legion reading may be byzantine, but the rationale isn't. The harder a comic is for the casual reader to enjoy (and the average writer to write), the more a true nerd will love it. The post must go on, however, so my first snapshot of this phenomenon is Legion of Superheroes 50 (1988), written by Paul Levitz, drawn by Keith Giffen and inked by Mike De Carlo.

Aside from my first post, this is the oldest comic I've yet to discuss. It's from an era when creators delivered a full meal of art and text that wasn't just a slim chapter in some foregone conclusion of a graphic novel. "Life and Death and the End of Time" is the issue's title, and brings our heroes- Brainiac 5, Saturn Girl, Mon El and Duo Damsel- up against the Time Trapper, a being embodying entropy.

"All things have ended here," says a rare narration box, describing the Trapper's surroundings, "even those that never began. Dreams have crumbled to dust, and lives have faded out of memory. In all the Universe, it seems there only remains energy enough to swirl the fragments of the past-" This mature, philosophical stuff is not immediately followed by punching. Levitz, the Legion's most lucid guide since 1977, always puts the characters first. Their personalities drive the story, no matter what natural disaster or villain smears the horizon. With the Trapper having recently killed Superboy, the aforementioned members have decided to hunt and obliterate the creature.

Brainiac 5, green-skinned and super intelligent, is the leader of this mission. Saturn Girl, a founding member, is telepathic. Duo Damsel can split into identical twins (and become one person again later). Mon El, like Superboy, is basically invincible, as well as super speedy and strong. What they have in common is a belief that the idea of the Legion must never be undercut by existential threats. They haven't told the rest of the team about hunting the Trapper. Both the act and the secret go against the team's constitution. If successful, however, they might not return.

Artist Giffen, away from his penciling chores since this run's first three issues, is back. When his career began in the mid-to-late 70s, creators like John Byrne and Jim Starlin had ushered in an era of marvelous technical detail and sweeping emotion. This time around, Giffen and inker De Carlo mime the the lantern-jawed ruggedness of legend Jack Kirby. The lines are bold, the tech is labyrinthine, and characters snarl readily. The battle against the Trapper, with a backdrop of cosmic desolation, features force-lines indicative of action too fast to be seen.

In the end, Brainiac 5 unleashes the power of the Infinite Man, a heroic entity locked in the comatose body of a man named Jaxon Rugarth. Embodying a Universe that operates in endless cycles, the Infinite Man is the Time Trapper's polar opposite. Their epic struggle eliminates the villain's theoretical (and literal) advantage over the Legion in a blaze of blue coruscation. When Brainiac 5 and company return home, badly injured but smiling, they know they owe the rest of the Legion an explanation. Ten years on as a fan myself, Brainiac 5's defense rings truer to me with every read. Next week, in "The Hottest Mess" part II, we'll find out why.