posted
I don't see how sales warrant this cancellation at all. Aren't titles like JOHAH HEX, MANHUNTER, and several more selling at much less? I don't want any of those titles cancelled by any means, but why the disparity?
Why not work the title into a crossover with LOTW? I know there've been complaints about such linkage, but in this instance it'd only make sense- and with all the characters inherent in a meeting of three legions, the space'd be *welcome*. Wouldn't it?
Why does DC keep pulling the title when there's 3-4 issues left in the creators' quiver?
I don't get it.
From: Knoxville, TN | Registered: Jul 2003
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posted
I expect that there will be another LSH book within a year. LSH has one of the most loyal cult followings in comicdom. That would be us, kids.
-------------------- The only character in all of literature who has been described as "badnass" while using the phrase "vile miscreant."
From: The Pyngwyn Colonies of Planet Hyustyn | Registered: Aug 2005
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Arm Fall Off Boy
Now starring in his own DC Comic, September 2011!
posted
Don't know if this is still accurate or not, but if anyone is interested:
dan.didio@dccomics.com
-------------------- Long Live all them Legions!
From: North Carolina | Registered: Feb 2008
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posted
Congratulations are in order, I guess, to all those here who never cared for Shooter's take on Threeboot. I know many of you who didn't were expecting Jim to somehow bring back the Silver Age instead of bringing the fresh forward-looking approach he did.
Again, congratulations. I look forward to hearing all of you complain about how whatever comes next is so wrong, too. Because I know that that segment of Legion fandom will never, ever be satisfied, no matter what approach is taken.
Look, I don't expect everyone to love Shooter's Threeboot run. I know it's not to everyone's taste. Nothing ever will be. But some of us did become invested in this version, just as others grew to love the reboot, TMK, etc. So before the men in black inevitably come out en masse with the I-tolja-so's and the barbs at Shooter, show some respect for the fans who are beyond disappointment about this.
After this debacle, I'm more convinced than ever that any version of the Legion DC puts out will never gain enough consistent fan support to be sustainable and therefore reboot-proof. If the next version centers on what Johns has done, it too will probably be successful until the novelty wears off and/or Johns or whomever leaves the book.
This is a Black Monday for the Legion. Part of me wishes DC would just bury it and let it rest in peace, rather than having us all go through this again every few years.
-------------------- "Suck it, depressos!"--M. Lash
From: The Underbelly of Society | Registered: Jul 2003
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quote:Originally posted by LardLad: After this debacle, I'm more convinced than ever that any version of the Legion DC puts out will never gain enough consistent fan support to be sustainable and therefore reboot-proof.
Wasn't the "never reboot-proof again" obvious back in 2004? (And I'm serious about that).
Next version's due to last two years at this rate of decline. Blame Waid & Wacker.
-------------------- My views are my own and do not reflect those of everyone else... and I wouldn't have it any other way.
quote:Originally posted by Arm Fall Off Boy: Don't know if this is still accurate or not, but if anyone is interested:
dan.didio@dccomics.com
You know what? I organized a letter-writing campaign and an online petition to try to save LSH31C from the axe, but I'm not going to do anything of the kind for this series. Not because I don't want to save it, but because it can't be saved by an act of will on anyone's part.
DC just doesn't know what they're doing, that's all.
And I don't mean that they're no good at their jobs, I just mean that they don't know what to do with the Legion. I believe that they're stuck for ideas. I'm sure they'd love to have a Legion series all ready to go for next spring, but they wouldn't know what to put in it. They don't have a writer, they don't have an artist, they don't have a premise. They need a vision.
I think it could be quite a while before we see the next Legion comic. I could be wrong, of course, but if it's three years from now and we're still waiting, well... you heard it here first.
posted
I guess I'm going to be optimistic about this. I have a feeling (which possibly is nothing more than misplaced hope) that DC has something big in line and they are not ready to announce it yet. I'm not surprised that this comic will end but I do think we will see something quickly down the road. Hope I'm write. If the Legion was doing so poorly by DC standards, they wouldn't have done the Legion of 3 Worlds and try and set things straight (which is what I think they have in mind to do). So I shall wait patiently. In the meantime I will enjoy 50 years of back issues.
-------------------- I have lived for the Legion and one day I shall die for the Legion.
From: Bgztl | Registered: Feb 2008
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quote:Originally posted by Tromium: DC also confirmed the Legion comic book will go on indefinite hiatus, and there will be NO series relaunch after LO3W.
This is a sad day for ALL Legion fans, no matter which version you are rooting for.
I agree with probably everyone: it's one terrible golden anniversary. But it's actually assuaged my worst fear. That is, that the threeboot would be cancelled and, with slap-in-the-face speed, replaced by a neo-80s Legion that really isn't even what it claims to be. If they are letting the Legion rest, they're hopefully going to keep their options open, which means leaving all three Legions in a usable state at the end of L3W. The Legion probably isn't about to get more sprocked-up than it already is. Not right away, anyway. We'll all be left hanging. But our emotional investment will remain intact.
I don't know where DC should go from here. I don't think they can find out by watching fan reaction.
I'd already been losing interest in the threeboot. Waid threw a lot of stuff in the air and didn't develop much of it. I'd have liked to see that version of the Legion fleshed out. Shooter hasn't been following up on much of it, and has introduced inconsistencies. Most disturbing are the apprent changes in Element Lad's and Colossal Boy's powers - back to older versions, more or less. Aside from the major continuity issue, this shows that he isn't really writing the Legion he was handed. He's writing an alternate Silver Age Legion.
-------------------- Tom Strong, on nostalgia: "I suppose it's a ready substitute for genuine feeling." - Tom Strong #6, Alan Moore
From: Calgary, Alberta | Registered: May 2008
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quote:Originally posted by Reboot: Wasn't the "never reboot-proof again" obvious back in 2004? (And I'm serious about that).
I guess I was an optimist?
Well, everyone who was around here at that time knows how I feel about that whole imbroglio - but the simple fact is that all the previous retcons/softboots/reboots had been done because (DC felt, at least, that) they needed to, to match the continuity situation of the time and the increasingly desperate retcons that had been pulled to stabilise things (kind of like what's going on in the markets right now, now I think of it...), and the 1994 Reboot was a once and final acknowledgement that it couldn't be stabilised - there was no desire on anyone's part to say "X years had never happened", so they brought things to an ending.
Whereas the 2004 "threeboot", as it's come to be called, was done because Mark Waid *wanted* to do it, with no wider goal beyond "this is Mark Waid & Barry Kitson's vision". And the obvious next step is that when someone ELSE's "vision" comes along, they'll make any and all changes - up to and including another full reboot - necessary to actualise that (logically, after all, no-one else's vision will exactly match WanK's - or the place where the last person to use WanK's version left it, at least).
If I was to put money on what'll happen, I would still say that Johns' Legion will get a series some time in 2009 (whether written by Johns or not, as they're clearly DC's favoured version right now) - although I would say there would be more to be gained in the longer term by pulling a Thor and letting the property rest for at least two full years.
I like how the Waid-Kitson concept was only loosely tied to the present. That might be the only way the Legion can work in the main DC universe.
There will be another Legion book within a year, I'm sure. But what will it be? What can it be? After the wild, chaotic expectations, hopes and antagonism of recent years (fuelled by L3W), what can DC do? I can't solve "the Legion Problem".
-------------------- Tom Strong, on nostalgia: "I suppose it's a ready substitute for genuine feeling." - Tom Strong #6, Alan Moore
From: Calgary, Alberta | Registered: May 2008
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quote:Originally posted by Triplicate Kid: I like how [it was] only loosely tied to the present. That might be the only way the Legion can work in the main DC universe.
Speaking in the abstract, you're probably right in that the Legion shouldn't be tied to the present in any direct way - certainly not in any way that DC continuity can affect the series.
Speaking PRACTICALLY, however... crossovers = sales (unless the well is pre-emptively poisoned, as with the fiasco of Amazons Attack). Notice how WanK's Legion essentially reset its' sales pattern by adding the then-top-selling Supergirl (not only to the book, but to the title of the book). Without that, the book would have sunk below the 25k mark by the start of its' third year.
quote:Originally posted by Triplicate Kid: I can't solve "the Legion Problem".
At this point, it's essentially insolvable - through everything they've done, DC have fragmented the fanbase that *might* buy a Legion title beyond repair. They can probably pull sales in - in the short term - by relaunching with high-selling creators, but as soon as they leave (Witness the sales freefall of the aforementioned Supergirl title after Jeph Loeb left) and aren't replaced by a similarly A-list team (who will almost certainly make major changes, if not a full reboot, to satisfy their own "vision"), sales will plummet again.
The best the Legion can expect in the medium term is to pull an Immortal Iron Fist - starring a character who's never held a solid solo fanbase - and become a stable mid-tier title by aggressively targeting a specific niche (in more general fiction terms) and executing it well. Aiming for "Legion fans" is a lose-lose, since "Legion fans" all want different things.
-------------------- My views are my own and do not reflect those of everyone else... and I wouldn't have it any other way.
posted
--activate a veryvery long post, don't worry, i made the important part bold--
ah, as you can guess, i really don't mind. issue 45 was so upsetting that i didn't even want to talk about it, i just set it down and tried not to think about it. if anyone else in the dc staff was reading the way i was then maybe that's why (if the sales didn't seem to be that bad)? i didn't like shooter's run and i was waiting for the end of it to see who took the reins next. for me, this ends my sadness 4 months early.
i didn't like where the book was going, and i think it's just a big, cumbersome, time-distorted monkey on dc's back. i can see why this book is very hard to sell. a giant cast, without the mainstream comprehension of Xmen, with a long and daunting past. it's really hard to get people into the legion, and i think dc tried VERY hard to salvage this book so give didio and the staff at dc some credit here :/. mark waid, i know most of you guys hate him or whatever, but he's a popular writer that many people respect, his name sells books. so they put this writer on the legion. not enough. they put SUPERGIRL in the book. not enough. i can see them looking at this and going "oh well, maybe because waid and bedard are too modern? they're not appealing to the older fans of the legion, we should appeal to them instead!" so they played time trapper reached BACK INTO TIME and got shooter, a writer from WAY WAY back in the day, that, despite my opinion of his work, is fairly well known and generally revered, AND he worked on the legion way way back in the day! AND paired him with a top-notch, super slick artist! it's not like they got third tier unknown people to work on the legion. their handling of the legion, to me, shows them trying a wide variety of things to try to make it stick, further evidenced by the legion's inclusion in Final Crisis. man i don't know WHAT you could do with the legion that would get people into the book beyond what they've tried already.
in an editorial position, what would you guys do? (and please, no answers like "well i wouldn't have done blahblah in the first place", unless you've built a time bubble, that's not feasible).
i think this rest period will be good for them to figure out what to do! but i don't think this is good-bye forever for the legion, not one bit! don't worry, guys! it'll come back! the smallville-legion episode will roughly coincide with the end of LO3W, right? i think legion'll get a boost of interest next year! i'm still looking forward to whatever comes next for the legion, and i'm positive that there's still something there. i also think LEGION might help out LSH! let's stay positive! i think the legion will come back better than before! 4-boot, lets go!!
also, i'll follow manapul's art wherever it goes, i'm waiting to hear what he's doing next. i really like his people but his legion run made me appreciate his INSANE attention to detail (check out some of those backgrounds some time, they're so intricate!!).
man, i'm surprised shooter just gave away the ending in that interview, yeah?! like... whoa, way to kill your own sales?!! i noticed that his future projects didn't involve dc...
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