Legion World Forums LEGION CLUBHOUSE The Legion of Super-Heroes Long Live the Legion! Should the Legion grow up?

Should they age into their early 20s, as they did pre-boot or stay teenagers - maybe going to 18/19, newer members could be 14-year olds. Archie has never aged.

I think I would prefer them to hit early 20s within a few years and freeze, somehow. 14 seems too young, really, for me; in their early 20s, they could be leading more interesting lives - I certainly wouldn't want to see "adult" legionnaires of 40 or 50 years old flying out on missions. Maybe in some other capacity....

I agree with you FC. I'd prefer to see them as 18-25 year olds and stay that way.

I prefer to see them change and grow. I say age them slowly over the next few decades until they're tired old fogies about 30 years old, then reboot them all again. Hopefully, I'll be alive to see it.

If Dick Grayson could grow up, I don't see why the Legion can't, especially since they did so before.

I'd be ok with slow aging -- say, having them hit their twenties in about ten years. It could be cool to have adult Legionnaires alongside younger ones at that point. The team would need new blood by then.
-- Wildfire, Dawnstar, Blok, Invisible Kid II and White Witch were kinda the real influx of new members that had any kind of staying power (and yet notice of those only Wildfire has been rebooted and on the team).
-- Tellus and Quislet haven't been seen since before TMK.
--Additions like Computo, Dragonmage and Catspaw are almost footnotes.
--And the jury's still out whether or not Gates, XS, Kinetix or Shikari will really become a part of the mythos as much as the others.

Let's look at the Legion as a continuum. For the most part, the stories have concentrated on their teenage years. However, I don't see why we can't look at different periods of their lives. As the fan base ages (and we do, Blanche), it would be interesting to catch a glimpse of the Legion's future. That doesn't mean the story line has to stay there, but it can visit. Plus, it's so fun to see new writers try to reconcile the future with the present. (little bit of malevolence there).

Most ot them seem to be in their late teens already. I want to see them grow up, see who they become, if they marry, if they have kids, if they stay with the Legion... Leaving them as teenagers would be pretty boring, IMO. That said, I don't want to see it happen to fast, either. Certainly not in real time.

I'd like to see the age progression like it was done pre-boot. I'm just not too thrilled about having a bunch of 14 year olds running around saving the universe and having children. And you would think that DC would at least update the age profiles, maybe in the new Secret Files, before they get irate letters about having a young teen mother on the team.

Slowly but surely.

We keep forgetting that "growing up" and "aging," physically and mentally, is more of a matter of concern reflecting us as the audience. It's unlikely to matter 1000 years hence -- even 100 years hence, if nanotechnology has anything to say about our cellular aging clocks.

I could see their remaining in a physical late-teens to late-twenties range indefinitely. They'd gain life and battle wisdom, to be sure, and would have challenges to their spirits. Many elements of them would grow, even if physical limitations did not.

Only the gods of comics continuity decree that real time (at some rate) or present-day limits must be followed. Even then, DC forgoes this for a "ten-year window" or some similar thing with Supes and other characters of our time. Why couldn't this limitation, along with other "age" continuity, be disregarded entirely for the Legion, once it's out of the teenage years?

Yes the Legion should grow up. However growing up should happen naturally and in keeping with the pace of the stories. I don't want the Legion kept as teenagers forever, but likewise I don't want them to have them aged overnight.

It would be enough for me to show that newer members were clearly younger than members with more tenure. I've never been a person who needs that much clarity--i.e., I don't really need to know how old everyone is, if we're on a real time schedule, etc. Keep it fuzzy--it's worked for Spiderman. I would like a more experienced group welcoming younger members, mentoring, etc. kind of scenario.

Indeed LL:

I asked this question a few weeks ago, but I didn't state my opinion on the matter.

I think aging for the Legion is good. The Legion survived Irma and Garth getting married, and Rokk and Garth leaving.

A natural (albeit gradual) flow of time makes for good story-telling.

I'm all for them entering their 20's and staying there...

One of the many things I hated about the reboot was the de-aging of the Legion. I kinda liked an older Legion, and I'd have no problem with a 40+ year old hero still being active. The fact that I'm in that age range is totally irrelevant.

I would say that they have already aged into their late teens, meaning some of the older members like Lar are probably now in their early twenties.

I would like to see them age more slowly, if only because comics time cannot follow real time. People do not freeze at the end of a cliffhanger for 30 days until their adventures continue in the next issue. 10 years of our time would generally be about 4-5 years comics time, especially given 1 year jumps like Legion Lost. This seems to be about where they are now.

But whither from here?

I think the Legion needs to remain teenagers, perhaps only slightly aged into their early to mid twenties.

This is probably an unpopluar choice, but I would like to see the Legion rebooted every 10-15 years. Let new creators creat a new Legion for each new generation.

I would like the Legion to remain as young as possible. They are the original teen group title and I think there are a lot of stories to tell about their youth while they are still young.

Especially since the reboot, I thought there was a real opportunity to show interpersonal relationships between the young Legionnaires. I thought this was one of the good things to come out of the post boot Legion (Chuck & Vi on a date, Triad's crush on M'Onel, Chamelon's secret crush on Spark, and others). I would like to see DnA work in more of this into the current storylines. Let the Legionnaires date people and different people. The Apparition/Ultra Boy relationship came too hard and heavy too soon - and having kids should be much further down the road for any members.

That's an interesting proposal. It would solve a lot of age-problems and could invigorate the book. Keep the best of the traditions and characters but start fresh. It might be easier than trying to evolve logically.

In the tradition of previous incarnations, Star Boy should get a goatee or something -- he's certainly old enough to have to shave. It would at least distinguish him a bit more from Invisible Kid.

I don't want a "reboot" but I wouldn't mind a generational approach. The old Legionnaires might still be around in an advisory role, but there would be new teen-aged Legionnaires as the main team.