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Interesting preview. Glad Ultra Boy always seems to be on hand to save the day. He's really been Levitz's go to guy lately. Wish this preview had focused on Star Boy though. Nonetheless, it does prove that Cosmic Boy has the guts to go it alone if he deems necessary.

Cos! DOING something!!

I know people think there's too much focus on the founders, but I'm just stoked to see him in action rather than sitting around headquarters wringing his hands over the state of the team...

Levitz really loves his Cosmic Boy doesn't he? Would've liked to see Star Boy's ragged team of rescuers instead though.

Another pretty solid issue!

I'm not sure why Cos didn't wear a mask while doing his breaking and entering though.

Interested in the new kids. Will Mwindaji's tracking ability earn him a place in the Legion? And I'm not really sure what Otaki's abilities are, but it's kind of cool to have a telepath born somewhere other than Titan.

And Comet Queen best be saving the day.

I hope Levitz isn't planning on replacing Dawnstar and Tellus with these new recruits so soon...

So I take it Comet Queen has resigned too. That was a short tenure.

This issue provided us with a lot of set up for next issue. Hope Levitz don't let us down.

Lots of good things in this issue. I loved Cos's look and solo mission and his rescue by Ultra Boy. I loved the interaction and skill shown by Dream Girl and Brainy. I really LOVED Duo Damsel on an actual mission. I really despise the character of Comet Queen and nothing about her annoying, immature behavior here changed my opinion. The two new recruits are way beyond lame. Super tracking ability is way too convenient for this story and is a one note power. And another mind reader?? Bring back Saturn Girl!

Agreed on all points. Brody.

Very solid issue. I liked the way the tension is building and the stakes are very high. It's more than the lives of Brainy and Dream Girl...war is coming. Loved the way Nura was portrayed. And I love ominous dreams from Nura. It's a Legion tradition.

Yeah, the two new recruits seemed very lame, which seems to indicate death and/or betrayal at their hands. Or is Comet Queen going to betray them? Did Saturn Queen mess with her far beyond what anyone thought?

My one true complaint is that the cover art was a bit misleading as none of Star Boy's team was captured or even encountered the Dominion in this issue. Cool cover though.

Yeah, although the scene on the cover hasn't happened (yet), I liked it. The best thing about it is it's the most Legionnaires we've seen on a cover so far this series - five. I'm ready for a big group shot.

The inclusion of cadets with a tracking power and telepathy might suggest that Paul was maybe planning on having Dawnstar and Tellus back, at some point, but has now resigned himself to their being gone a bit more long term.

A telepath is almost de rigeur at this point, but I'm not a fan of tracking powers. Either the tracker can find whatever the mystery item / person / place du jour is, and the mystery is blown to hell, or the tracker *can't* find this thing for a specific plot-defined reason, in which case, why the hell even have a tracker?

Dawnstar gets by on a cool visual, and some other useful powers (spaceworthy flight at lightspeed, for instance). I'm not sure Mwinadji (I just made up some random letters, no idea if it's spelled right...) is gonna match that.

Plus, his name is unpronounceable. We already have Mxyzptlk for that.

I get my issue on Thursday, but the previews are nice.
I just don't know why Cos couldn't have flown out on his own.
He has a flight ring, right?

I read this today, wooh!

...and quite liked it! I know that the 'ragtag rescue team' aren't going to save the day on their own and will end up needing the rest of the Legion to get them out of this, but seeing how well Brainy and Dreamy have been treated so far I have a feeling that Chuck, Lu et al are gonna get a much more respectful showing against the Dominators than they did against Cosmic King (even if they do lose).

Admittedly, I'm disappointed in the newbies' powers. Even if they are just thinly veiled plot replacements for Dawnstar and Tellus, there are a million other ways you could accomplish the same feats with a different power. A planetary-scale Jack Hawksmoor could accomplish the same thing as a planetary-scale tracker, and do other cool things besides. Someone with specifically postcognition-related psionic abilities might make an interesting opposite number to Dream Girl while still being able to mimic certain aspects of telepathy. And my other issue with the new recruits is that their abilities seem so passive! Admittedly, we haven't seen what Otaki can actually do yet, but I hope she's not another in a long list of Legion women with purely subtle abilities...

Those little qualms aside, I really liked this issue and am looking forward to seeing where this storyline goes!

my main beef is: why two new characters? why not Mandalla? why not Monica Sade or Veilmist or Westerner or even Catspaw?

sigh...although the story is good. just wish I would love to see Mandalla in action.

They seem like red shirts from Star Trek T.O.S.

*adios* ...

And why Lydda in not in these rescue team?
I hope The dominators kill Comet Queen and the newbies.
I´m very bored ....about the new recruits...
All the fans are be waiting for the real legionnaires.... Saturn Girl, Sensor Girl, Lightning Lad, Blok, Black Witch, Matter Eater Lad, Quislet...
And forgotten ones.....Kono, Veilmist, Andromeda, Kinetix, XS, Gear, Wave, Impulse....

So, random observations time;

I like seeing Cosmic Boy out of the chair and *doing stuff.* So, so, so done with seeing him sitting in front of a bunch of viewscreens whining about whatever.

Ah, Ultra Boy, with your ultra-speed. Not the intuitive choice for a tactical evac team, and that's cool.

Brainy confirms again that Dreamy is one of the smartest Legionnaires, which is nice, although I liked it better in the Universo Project.

The pages of Mon-El and the UP delegation were, IMO, wasted in a 20 page comic. Nine pages in, almost halfway through the book, and we're still on stuff that could have been explained in a couple of word-balloons on page 1;

Anywho, odd art on page 10. Cos looks like he's got a black eye and Mon-El is either whistling dixie or, uh, something else...

But Lu merging looks badass.

These little Dominator minion guys jumping at Brainy and Dreamy are totally cute. I think they'd make great plush toys.

And... ten more pages of talky talk. Yawn.

I'm not sure if the scene with Bouncing Boy saying 'get out of my mind' a couple times is setting him up to be the unintentional traitor (someone is mind-jobbing him? perhaps even Otaki?), or just a fuzzy panel.

LOL on Ultra Boy! Totally agree about the decompressed storytelling. We get all this glacially slow buildup and then the climax will probably be over in a bang and a whimper.

Technically, Ultra Boy's power set includes flight OR super-speed. I would further submit that if it's the ring that's doing the flying, Jo should not be able to make it go super-fast.

So true, so true! With Ultra Boy it's been all about the hair lately!! The various artists have done amazing things with that hair. It just shimmers! It's a creative feature that helps Ultra Boy stand out among the rest of the Legion. I think it's perfect for his personality and something for us to make fun of as well!

I thought that myself, but then realized that 'super-speed' has to come with some sort of acceleration / propulsive force built in, and if he's flying when it kicks in, it should make him fly faster (and, if he's swimming, it should make him swim faster, too, although I'm not sure we've ever seen him operate underwater, which is kinda odd for a guy based off of the character Jonah...).

He's been shown using super-speed while flying for ages, so it seems that he can do both (the time he flew beside Lazon and punched him in the face, comes to mind).

Jo's power is kind of an exercise in waving your hands furiously in protest anyway. If he used super-speed without either invulnerability or some sort of speed-force ability to ignore friction, he'd flatten like a pancake and burst into flames. If he used super-strength without invulnerability, he'd smash every bone in his body the first time he super-punched something. And his 'penetra-vision' appears to be both X-Ray vision *and* telescopic vision, at the same time.

Heck, the power write-ups for him don't even mention any longer that he can channel ultra-energy for flight, without a Flight Ring, since it never really comes up...

Still, he's my favorite of the Krypto-class dudes, since he's got to work that much harder to hang at their weight class, due to his limitations, and yet, he's also got no red sun weakness, no inconsistent magic weakness and no kryptonite / lead weakness, which can sometimes prove handy.

I'd been thinking that it was just a lush mane of hair, but there have been a lot of close ups of it lately (in this very issue, in fact) that depict it as more of braids or locks. That's kind of cool to see.

The Legion has always been a standout in having so many brunettes. Comic folk are so often blondes, redheads or have black hair, that plain old brown hair ends up looking kind of exotic, by comparison!

He led an underwater mission in Adv. 371. That's the only one I can think of right now.

I liked the issue but it bugged me that you had 2 nonmembers saying they would be willing to die trying to rescue Brainy & Dreamy. They and the retired members are willing to risk their lives while the active team sits by? Hope there's something being left out because it just seems wrong that the active members would let an underpowered team do this.

Good points, MEM.

He is vulnerable to 'radiation'. It is rarely touched on ... probably because radiation is everywhere.

IIRC.

I like Jo though. I think Morrison's take on Smasher ... the copy of Ultra Boy was interesting ... he would 'download' powers for various missions. Making him a bit more like a Dupe Boy, or an Erg 1. But its not unreasonable to think Jo would be able to learn to use his energy in new ways for new power sets. Truly making him more versatile than a Kryptonian. (even If still less powerful. )

Re: Jo's hair

I didn't like it myself ... thought it looked like cords or strings or something. dread locks ...

I do love how many brunettes there are in the LSH, in my fantasy world ... I imagine because most people in the future are ethnically mixed ... and people mate across cultural and ethnic lines with reckless abandon.

I wonder when editorial will realize that if they didn't decompress the storytelling, we fans would probably be asking a lot less questions about their reasoning? After all, we'd be too interested in the issue to question our suspension of disbelief.

I agree.

Me too! Bring back the real Academy graduates (the ones people actually wanted to see join) and just about anyone else. Also, the book could use some drama -- the deaths of the new recruits would do that.

Technically yes. But Jo does seem to be able to lend speed to the ring -- kinda as Wally West used to be able to lend speed to other characers or objects.

I submit that there is more to Jo's powers that he realizes. Actually, I think that could be true of most of the Legion -- whose powers seem to be stuck at Silver Age levels. Doesn't anyone abilities evolve over time?!

Indeed!

Heck, Element Lad's powers have significantly *downgraded.*

I've noticed that the word-blurbs are deceptive as well. Lightning Lad/Lass have blurbs stating that they have powers of 'electrical manipulation,' which is nothing at all like what they do, which is 'chuck lightning at people.' They don't manipulate the electricity in people's ray guns or computers, causing them to fritz out, or do anything that seems like 'electrical manipulation.' They just shoot lightning. That's no more 'manipulating electricity' than I am 'manipulating kinetics' by firing a gun or punching someone.

In theory, if Garth or Ayla (or Mekt) can actually manipulate electricity, they could cause a person's body to collapse nervelessly to the ground by messing with the electrochemical signals between nerves. They might even be able to reprogram computers. Instead? ZARK!

Tyroc is the only one that we've seen significant development of his powers lately, because his powers have been re-imagined.

Timber Wolf has gone in the other direction, having apparently forgotten that the power that got him into the Legion was 'super-acrobatics' and not 'claws, regeneration and super-senses.'

IIRC Jo was shown using super speed for flight back in Adv 380.
I think that using invulnerability alone would also enhance his normal strength by not having to worry about pulled muscles.

Seeing a one-sleeved Brainy cavorting about evoked memories of the Newell "Exile" storyline from the 80's--which never really was resolved with any satisfaction...

OMG! That was the first thing I thought of as well!

I enjoyed that storyline. Maybe when Dawnstar gets back from being "Lost" we can resolve it some day. Didn't Levitz reference that story in his new run of the Legion in the past couple of years...?

One thing I liked adopt the character Dart in the Atari Force series back in the 1980's is that the artists would actually "show" you part of her dreams/visions. I have always wished that was the way Dream Girl's abilities were portrayed in the Legion. It would be interesting to get teasers of things to come through her visions.

If Jo can lend his superspeed to the ring's flight, then, how could Pol have beaten him to the magic lock, thereby dying?
Or, wasn't Jo there?
(I'd look it up if I still had the issue.)

Wasn't he off fetching Cosmic Boy from Earth then?

Although Jo MUST be able to lend speed to his flight ring, given how he was always shown speeding off into battle alongside Mon-El, Wildfire and Dawnstar...

No invulnerability for space travel?
A transuit, I guess.

Good point on that one. That one-power at a time limitation sure is easy to forget about.

Finally picked up my copy of this issue. The art was either glorious or barely adequate depending on which part of the story. I understand Lu wanting to bring in a tracker and a psi as the group has been using members with those abilities successfully before. Brainy and Nura were the highlight though her saying they will be betrayed lacked the punch I think it was supposed to convey. Jo, Rokk and Mon talking like friends was well done. I still don't understand why the Espionage Squad weren't sent in though. 7 out of 10 this month. Not as good as last month though I'm still on board.

He already knew about Pol's death when he picked up Cos.

As I recall, the fact that Pol could outrace the super-speedsters was explained by a combination of his headstart plus the fact that flight rings are particularly responsive to the will of their owner. Apparently he just really *wanted* to get their first.

Yes, I remember that explaination.
That's why I brought up Jo's superspeed in comparison.
His superpowered flight speed combined with the ring's speed and will factor really should have made Jo the fastest, discounting Lar and Dawnstar. who also have superspeed flight and rings.

I vaguely recall that Wildfire, Dawnstar, Superboy and Mon-El were the 'fastest,' with Ultra Boy only hanging with them on occasion.

Anywho, his ultra-speed *has* to have some sort of built-in propulsion, or else he'd never be able to run faster than a human body can fall (125 to 200 MPH, generally, depending on body position). Since he obviously can, the ultra-energy has to be 'pushing' him somehow (just as the Speed Force 'pushes' the Flash-peeps), and if it can do that when he's on the ground, there's no reason why it can't do that when he's in the air (or in water, or in space).

Thanks, EDE. I remember why I got confused now - I remember Ultra Boy, Dawnstar and Wildfire were among the first to escape from the large "web" trap that the whole Legion plunged into. Then I remember Jeckie telling those three to go off and find help. Somehow I remembered it as them jetting off at once even before the other Legionnaires freed themselves and found the lock.

Re willpower, I remember this was touched upon with Dream Girl and possibly Blok, too.

The obvious answer was that Jo didn't want to die in a keyhole, and was happy to view Pol make the ultimate sacrifice from a safe distance. In that situation, Jo switched to his power of "Ultra-Carefulness".