Legion World Forums LEGION CLUBHOUSE The Legion of Super-Heroes Long Live the Legion! "Last Son": thoughts on the Superman cult(s)

In the 'Foundations' story arc, Superboy (Kon-El) shows up, and all hell breaks loose with adherents to a religion/philosophy/number of apocalyptic cults dedicated to Kal-El, the "Last Son" (of Krypton, presumably). Rokk Krinn a.k.a. Cosmic Boy is revealed to be an adherent to the "philosophy" of the "Last Son", and is cold and hostile towards the time-stranded teen hero. Other, more religious cultists frenzy and riot, sects clash, chaos ensues.

Now, I can understand why Superman would inspire, centuries later, a certain amount of reverence. He even came back from the dead*, a qualifier in many cultures for a mortal to ascend to godhood. Kal-El has many other qualities which I don't think I need to expand upon here, which makes him godlike in the eyes of his contemporaries, much less their thousand-year descendants. In addition, he has encountered peoples from many other planets, including Daxamites**. The Coluans, I am sure, have an interesting view of Superman, given his troubles with Brainiac.

What bothers me about this story element is how it was thrust upon us with no prior set-up. Rokk Krinn holding Superman in awe and striving to hold to that heroes ideals is believable. Rokk Krinn revealing a heretofore unmentioned quasi-religious philosophical life-guideline that he feels strongly about enough to hate someone sheerly for not being the Superperson he would rather meet, that is a little less believable. I think it would have been mentioned at some point if it had not been made up solely for the story.

The face of the cults/philosophy/whatever smacks of potential racism to me, if that is the correct word. Despite being from Braal, Cos is genetically human. He has Terran ancestors. Superman, despite being an alien to Earth, is a Terran hero. He is a superpowered being from another planet who protected his adopted race. Is this a case of "new kid makes good, feel-good story of the millennia"? How is this viewed in the 31st century? Terran-centric in a galaxy with, from what we've seem, a significant non-Terran human population. Alien as god. It's a concept with a multitude of possible significancies.

We've seen it before, with Lar Gand, which should have been more galaxy-shaking than it was, I suspect. In all the hubbub of Superboy's arrival and the reactions to him, nothing is mentioned of Gandians. I wonder if this is a retcon, replacing Lar with Superboy? Has the ban on mentioning Superman and anything to do with him in the Legion books been lifted? So it seems.

Had Legion Lost not fallen out the way it did, would the Legion's home galaxy have come to revere the last Trommite? Jan did, after all, have the power to change reality: to turn dust into water, to change rock to air, to transmute weapons to more harmless things. Had his life not been twisted radically off-track by the events of Legion Lost, would he eventually have become revered as a (perhaps messianic) patron of peace, or perhaps forgiveness, or even plentitude without greed? And is he not a "Last Son", as well?

Religion is a curious thing in Legion books, especially in the post-boot: interesting things get tossed our way as plot elements, but rarely followed up on. For example, time has passed between the events of 'Foundations' and the current story. Superboy is still around. Lar is still wearing his "old" costume. And they're working together. A concordance of inspirations for millions of sentients. What are the reactions to this? We don't know. Perhaps Gandianism no longer exists, retconned by the cult of the "Last Son", and all of the followers of that faith except Rokk died while Darksied was kicking around, destroying time and stealing Clark Kents into the future.

Can you imagine what would have happened if that 'other' Superboy had stayed with the Legion? Would Rokk have liked him better, despite being a teenager who had done none of the things that Superman did, having not yet been him? Would Rokk have forgiven him his flaws easier than he would have Kon's? Why does Rokk bear such antipathy towards Kon-El? Perhaps he knows something we don't. Perhaps the annals of his guiding philosophy preserved some record of Kon, which was unflattering. Perhaps it mentioned Lex Luthor*** as his 'other father'.

All in all, while this whole thing is a concept worthy of interest and deep thought, it bothers me because it was so very contrived, and has not been mentioned since the story of it's origin.

I invite you to add your thoughts on the matter.

snowsparkle


Glaring Continuity Problems

*...which he should not have been able to do, given that this was accomplished with help from the pocket-universe the pre-boot Legion's post-Byrne Superboy was from, which officially never existed.

**...who, in the 21st century, had their planet practically annihilated. The question is, how is there life on Daxam now? Or did they, somewhat unbelievably, colonise other presumably lead-free worlds? Perhaps this disastrous incident helped cultivate the xenophobia we saw earlier in the post-boot?

***...revealed as the alleged "other contributor" of DNA to making Kon-El, as they couldn't fathom Kryptonian DNA or something like that. Until this was brought up in Teen Titans, it was someone else.

Yes, the thing that bothers me about it is how it just suddenly appeared when they wanted to shoe-horn in Superboy and suddenly give his appearance relevance to the 31st century.

Rokk's met Superman and Superboy before, but this "religious belief" wasn't mentioned? And of course Valor's been completely ignored since. It feels like a de facto retcon to me (even in "Legion World #1" they were drawing comparisons between M'on and Supes rather than Valor). Well, it'll likely be moot in a few months anyway.

One thing that never occured to me until just now is that having Valor (or Superboy) on the team makes him their version of Thor -- a genuine mythological figure who's "godliness" is up for debate. But unlike Thor, M'on doesn't lay claim to godhood yet has many followers (unlike Thor who has only a few at this point). The mythological figure aspect could've been a lot more interesting if played with rather than using it as an excuse to keep M'on distanced from the team.

Word. Also, remember the Young Justice "Our World at War" special? There, Lar, had taken on the Superboy name in order for him to be a source of inspiration. It struck me as very weird at the time, especially since The Cult of the Last Son hadn't been mentioned yet, and Lar revealing his true identity would have had the same effect. Notice that that tidbit has also been ignored as well.

I agree that the Legion can certainly explore religion or this Last Son/Gand philosophy further (without turning into a vertigo book that is).

I honestly think the entire Rokk/Kon-El thing was so that Legion readers feel sympathy towards Kon. I know guys that hated Kon-El as Superboy but felt for him and got mad at Rokk.

It would be somewhat cool to make a parallel between the Kon fans and Legion fans at odd with each other via the Cult of the Last Son and Gandians.

Jorge (a Gandian for sure)

The Cult of the Last Son was certainly one of the more intriguing tidbits that DnA tossed out and never developed - or perhaps never had the opportunity to pursue. The all-ages/superhero comic format isn't that well suited to dealing with such ideas in depth - although it would have been satisfying to see some of the questions Snowsparkle raised addressed.

The Last Trommite is a very intriguing concept for a religion! Even the Progenitor business could have been dealt with somehow - that part of Jan's history ignored or modified ("reinterpreted") by adherents.

At the end of the day, however, I wish the writers had continued with the Valor cult theme, developed in v.4, a few references in the post-boot but generally ignored. I suppose they had to put some extra trimmings on the Superboy re-introduction, and a reverential cult was a logical addition.

We never learned much about the Catastrophists, either. Calamity King could have been their high priest!

Another thought on the "Last Son" cult - it was mentioned in Frank Miller's "The Dark Knight Strikes Again" - don't know if this was the first instance of it in the DCU, and I missed it until I was re-reading that book this afternoon. There wasn't any detail - just a campy/joking reference - or at least that's how I read it.

(There were also a number of Legion costumes worn in this story, on both bad guys and good guys....)

Great minds think alike Snowsparkle. I've had an on going back burning plot line in my Legion 35C stories about Trom Buddhists - a cult kind of based on the pacifistic views that Jan held.

Ok so I kind of butchered those views lately but the original sentiment was the same

And thank you FC for pointing this thread out to me and SS as this is great!