Legion World Forums LEGION COMPANION Dr. Gym'll's Cultural Rarities Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe... the Women

...came out today. There were nice entries for Crystal, Medusa, Valkyrie, Spider-Woman (who's given *major* prominence on the cover), Snowbird... lots of others.

In the front of the book, there was a list of Marvel heroines who'd appear in other volumes of the Handbook series.

Polaris was listed as appearing in the Spider-Man volume. I'm not sure why she'd be published there... but, anyway, did anyone buy this volume?

If so, would they be willing to scan the page of her entry in and post it here?

Pretty please?

Hmmm.... Polaris is in the Spider-Man book because she used to be with Ice-Man who was part of "Spider-Man and his Amazing Friends"?? ... I have no idea. That is odd...

They goofed, Polaris was NOT in the Spider-Man issue of the OHOTMUs. She was in the X-Men issue. Regardless, here's your scans:

Page 1
Page 2

Scans obviously being used without permission, and hosted via ImageShack. Naturally, the scans may take a bit to load, since they're a little big, to be readable.

Now, I'll be over here mocking her costume.

J

She is one messed up chick, and what up wiht the costume and the headgear? Did Elvira suddenly forma afashion line for superheores?

They let an artist with heavy manga/anime influences do some costume redesigns. They're universally silly.

J

Thanks, Kinetix!

I appreciate you scanning those pages in for me... even if it is Lorna wearing the worst costume she's ever put on (and that's saying something...)

Oh, now I've got to see the pic.

Poor Lorna. She can never seem to catch a break. I liked the Cockrum outfit the best, I think.

Her green costumes are best - the original Steranko one, or the similar one she was wearing on Genosha.

The purple ones (including the Cockrum suit & her current one) are just plain ugly.

I wasn't too keen on her Genosha era costume, the skulls were a bit much, and it felt a little bland otherwise.

J

The Steranko one was tops, followed closely by Cockrum's. Why don't they return her to the orighinal look? It's ludicrous. Don't screw with perfection. They tried to improve on it and failed. These guys are no Steranko or Cockrum.

I liked the Steranko one as well.

Here's a version of Polaris I really like... based on Steranko's stellar costume. Once Lorna's equalized in temperment (assuming she survives the upcoming HOUSE OF M), maybe she'll go back to this one.

http://www.dynamicforces.com/htmlfiles/p-C97921.html

The Cockrum one's great, too... VERY similar to Shrinking Violet's 70's uniform, with a funky collar added. Loved it, too. She wasn't Polaris till she wore that one, I don't think.

I liked the Genosha outfit well enough-- though I wasn't crazy about the artist's rendition of Lorna.

Phil Jimenez drew a pretty eye-catching look for Lorna during the Grant Morrison era .

For her WORST look, search no further than that horrible period when she was a She-Hulk clone with a bride of Frankenstein hair-do. *shudder*

The half-Magneto uniform/half wedding dress look was... interesting, too.

That bat-headdress, though... nothing's worse than that.

Maybe if she swapped costume colours with that Violet - the reddish-purple with the green hair is utterly vugly. It's like when they insisted on putting blue-skin Angel in the red version of his Neal Adams suit for a couple of years - eugh. Especially when the dark blue version looked great against the blue skin.

What's the obsession with putting green with purple? Yeah, it catches the eye, but it's oogly! Fine for one or two characters, but it seems to be rather prevalent.

And Steranko's was indeed the best.

J

The strange thing about Steranko's version was that whenever another artist tried to put her in it, they didn't seem to understand it.

I mean, every single time I can recall it appearing, Lorna is always standing in a position where most of it is obscured. It was almost as if they didn't know exactly how it was supposed to work.

But looking at that bust. I must say, I agree that its the best.

What's the full list of profiles for this one?

Here's the list:

Arana
Black Widow II
Sharon Carter
Clea
Crystal
Dagger
Dark Angel
Dazzler
Domino
Enchantress
Firestar
Gaea
Hellcat
Hepzibah
Jolt
Jennifer Kale
Misty Knight
Lucy in the Sky
Magik
Maker
Medusa
Meggan
Millie the Model
Moondragon
Moonstone
Mystique
Namorita
Nemesis
Puck
Rogue
Roma
Satana
Scarlet Witch
Sersi
Shann the She-Devil
Silver Sable
Sister Grimm
Snowbird
Songbird
Spider-Girl
Spider-Woman
Thor Girl
Topaz
Valkyrie II
Vantage Vindicator

There are fairly decent write-ups about the characters. I learned/relearned some things that I either didn't know or had forgotten... like Moondragon having a sister named Sundragon.

Or that the Samantha Parrington Valkyrie has been around for as long as she has.

This handbook also offers a bit of a glimpse into Marvel's future, I think... since many of the characters are going to be featured in upcoming titles.

The best pin-up, for me, is that of Moondragon-- which features a uniform I haven't seen her in, but quite like.

Sundragon is Moondragon's cousin not sister.

Here's a good profile of her:

http://www.marvunapp.com/Appendix2/sundragon.htm

I'm wondering what did Meggan's profile say under Identity/Class? That question has been pretty highly debated for years. Some think she's just a just a mutant while others (myself included) are more inclined to think she's some kind of Fey Folk.

Sounds like a good assortment of characters, I wish I could get a copy.