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Long time readers will know that I'm a huge fan of
the Legion of Super-Heroes. Very soon, the new Legion
will be on the stands, a new lease on life, for
fandom's favorite title. At the end of the recent
Legion Special, with the Teen Titans crossover, we got
to see some of this "new" Legion.
Most of the new costumes look fine, to me, though I
have issues with Sun Boy's costume. Just doesn't look
like something he'd wear, unless they're changing his
personality enormously. I won't bother with the
characters already shown, this time around. Maybe some
other time, if I grow to hate one of the new outfits.
for now, I'm just playing with the characters we
haven't seen, in the previews or anything.
I'm not going to go into their histories or anthing,
because anything that came before is subject to
change, and so there's no point in a long-winded
description of previous costumes and histories. In
most cases, I've drawn some inspiration from earlier
costumes, either from the lines of the costumes or
merely a color scheme. So let's get started . . .
I'm going to do these in alphabetical order, just to
keep things simple. First off, there's Bouncing Boy, a
character I always hated, until I drew him for the
first time. It was then that I realized how much fun
he could be to draw. Besides, it's kinda nice to have
a fat hero around, for a change. I used his
traditional costume colors, but styled it as more of a
dress suit, than the traditional circus acrobat style.
In deciding which characters to include, I could pass
up the old Legion of Substitute Heroes, so that make
Chlorophyll Kid, next on the list. I gave the Kid a
sex change and figured anyone as into plants as
Chlorophyll Kid would very likely spend a great deal
of time in the sun, so I made her fairly dark-skinned.
The green hair is merely a fashion statement. Her
costume is actually a living plant symbiote which she
can control and change, at will.
Next in line is Color Kid, also an old Sub. In his
case, I made him alien, just on a whim. There's
nothing about his powers that require him to be human,
after all. This Kid's costume is responsive to his
powers, so he can alter the colored portions to suit.
Or maybe it's like a "mood suit" and changes colors
like a mood ring.
Dawnstar is one of those characters you either love
or hate. I know a lot of people never liked her, but
there were times I enjoyed having her around. As an
American Indian, myself, it's sometimes annoying how
few of us make it into the comics books as either
heroes or villains, these days. I didn't do much with
her costume, this time, I just streamlined bits of it.
Next comes Ferro Lad, a character I always
appreciated and who never really had a chance to
shine, in any of the various Legion series. I styled
his costume along the lines of his old ones, keeping
the mask and such. I never could understand the
reasons for his mask, by the 30th century (now, the
31st) you'd think people would be used to seeing
hideous aliens on an almost daily basis, so how bad
could this guy's face be? Also, in keeping with the
sort of "retro" hero feel of the new series (the new
Legion is a youth movement of what amounts to
historical re-enactors, fixated on the heroes of the
21st century) I put the "Fe" on the mask in Roman
alphabet, rather than Interlac. The belt buckle
represents a cross-section of a steel I-beam.
Back to the Substitutes with Fire Lad, now. This is a
guy who breathes fire and his head burns like a match,
for no apparent reason. I borrowed a little from
Firestorm, on this one, figuring a kid with a flaming
head might identify with him.
I don't know how they're gonna work this guy into the
new continuity, but it won't be the Legion without
Mon-El. As I was drawing this one, I thought it had a
kind of military feel, but still keeps the essence of
his original costume.
Now, we come to Night Girl, a character I've always
liked. Back in the 70s, Mike Grell gave her one of the
sexist costumes in comics and I borrowed a bit from
that one, but reworked it to make it a bit more
practical. I like the occassional night-black costume.
As she comes from a world with no daylight, I figure
Night Girl would be quite pale, as well. She probably
has night vision to rival a cat's, too.
Back in the 80s, Polar Boy became the first
Substitute Legionnaire to make his way into the
Legion-proper. For my design, I made him a humanoid
alien. I know there's already one blue-skinned alien
in the Legion, but I don't see why that should be a
problem. There's lots of pink-skinned folks!
I was thinking, as I was deciding on characters to
include, whether or not I should use Blok. I never
liked Blok, he/she/it just never did anything for me.
Also, since there's already Stone Boy, from
Substitutes, who needs two rock guys? For Stone Boy, I
decided to go "alien" as well. I combined Stone Boy
with Blok, a bit, for the costume itself.
Now, with the relaunch of the Legion, there's one
more chance to get Timber Wolf right! I borrowed from
several of his old costumes, for this one. Yes, I like
the Dave Cockrum version, best.
One of the more popular characters from the 80s
Legion was Dream Girl's sister, the White Witch. She
tended to be overused, for awhile, there, but she was
always an interesting character.
Last, but certainly not least (actually, this was one
of the first designs I did for this article and one of
the first characters I considered using) is Wildfire.
Once again, I've gone back to the source and kept the
costume elements I liked from Dave Cockrum's original
design. Other elements, I've reworked to suit my own
aesthetic sense.
Well, that's all for this trip. Hope you like them.
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