Legion World Forums LEGION CLUBHOUSE The Legion of Super-Heroes How Would YOU Have Done the JLA/JSA/LSH Teamup?

I've never read the story, but my understanding is that it's not that great.

So how should a team-up between the Silver Age versions have worked?

Actually, I have a soft spot for the story. It was a favorite of mine as a kid... but I can see how LSH fans wouldn't care so much for it, as the Legionnaires aren't portrayed as powerful as they should be.

Me, I wouldn't have had a tale where all 3 teams join up. Instead, I would have come up with some plot element that begins with the 1940s JSA, pops up again during the Satellite-era of JLA and turns up a third and final time during the Grell-era LSH.

Was that the one with the Bell, the Jar, and the Wheel or something like that and three demons?

Yes, Mordru and the Demons 3-- Abnagazar, Rath and Gast (spellings iffy there) vs. the JL/SA and LSH.

right, the story that didn't make much sense -- too many characters crammed into a very tiny plot

i was a huge fan of the JLA/JSA team ups, and already hooked on the Legion, but i felt bad for folks who might have their first exposure to the Legion through that story

the Legionnaires were particularly formless in it, with neither personas nor abilities showcased well

if i was gonna do it silver age, i would have had a dilemma that necessitated rescue from the future -- the Infinite Man, for instance, who could pull the Golden Age JSA into battle with the sattelite JLA and the new All-Stars JSA members (Star-Spangled Kid, Huntress, Power Girl -- Doc Midnite, Wildcat and Dr. Fate were also usually integral squad members at the time) ... throw in the Cockrum-Grell sexy Legion (maybe Karate Kid, Brainiac 5, Dream Girl, Element Lad, Collosal Boy, Princess Projectra) and you've got a juicy bunch, ripe for conflict and interaction

How funny - now that I think about it I think this story probably was my first introduction to the Legion. The JlofA was the first series I ever collected fanatically so this would probably have been among the first comics I ever read.

I can't remember much of it though but what I do remember wasn't good. Weren't only something like 4 Legionnaires (Shadow Lass, Sun Boy, Princess Projectra and Lightning Lad from memory) spot-lighted? That's hardly a good indication of what the Legion or a Legion story is like. The worst thing for me though was probably the *extremely* tired JLA plot of splitting the teams into smaller groups so that they could each go off and search for some missing item or person or something, all encountering some not particularly difficult or interesting obstacle along the way. This plot was used over and over and over in that series and I think by this story I was tired of it.

How would I have done it differently? Well I really liked MLLASH's idea of having a foe that tackled them all at different points in history, but that would've meant missing out on seeing the teams fighting together which is something I'm sure most readers would've really wanted to see.

I like Andy's idea of some villain from the future driving the plot too. Maybe a time-war could have started betweeen the JLA villain the Lord of Time and the JSA villain Per Degaton and during the fight to stop them a handful of members from both teams could have been flung into the timestream and stranded in the 30th Century. Here they would have had to team up with the LSH to not only stop the two baddies (and the person that was really behind it all - the Time Trapper) but also find their way home too. Or something like that.

Yeah, it definitely wasn't a classic, though I expect someday it'll see a reprinting in the "Crisis On Multiple Earths" series of trades.

I like Andy's ideas as well. With something like this, you need to do a JLA/Avengers kind of thing and pull in everybody.

Yes, that's true.



Man, you can say THAT again! Back in July/August 1980 (when I read my it as a German translation, my second major super-hero comic and my FIRST Legion experience et all), I first couldn't stand the Legion! Because of that terrible comic.

Fortunately, though, a few weeks later, I read a German trade paperback collecting the Legion origin, the Dave Cockrum Legionnaires feature, Tyroc's initiation, the story about Phantom Girl's brother and some minor other Legion stories-- and have been a major LSH fan ever since.

But that was no thanks to that horrible JLA/JSA/LSH team-up. In fact, thanks to that dreadful story, I couldn't stand the Legion at first, and thought they were "dull", except for Saturn Girl, whose costume I loved from the first panel on. If I hadn't read that other Legion collection when I absolutely didn't have something (anything) else to read, that would have been the end of my path with the Legion.

But yeah, all said I'd say it was one of the worst Legion stories ever. And I'm willing to bet money that many people who knew the Legion only from their exposure in that team-up were the same ones who claimed in the Eighties that the Legion was a lame feature. Certainly that team-up gave them no reason to check the Legion out in their own stories. Who wants to read about characters as dull, uninspiring, generic and stupid as they were depicted in that story.

I wasn't even aware that this thread existed. I had started a similar one earlier this year:

https://www.legionworld.net/forums/u...s=Dick+Dillin&Search=true#Post806129

Hi, 'LLash!

You really liked that story? Whew, you're really charitable.

But in one regard, I must give that story its due: that story makes it quite clear that normally, even the JLA (with Supes and GL) and the JSA (who have Dr Fate, the Flash, and another GL aamong them, in addition to Power Girl) would be no match for even that small squad of Legionnaires who took part in this story.

But the Legionnaires were at a heavy disadvantage from the start: First, they were ambushed by Mordru, who weakened them; then, in a weakened state, they were further dazzed after they collided with those pink demon's solid magic cloud; and afterward, they were further held down by the fact that they didn't dare to unleash their full power against magically controlled victims. (Never mind that there were other elements working against them, such as being magically forced to carry Mordru's body while fighting GL and other JLAers.)

So yeah, while I normally *would* expect Lightning Lad, Ultra Boy, Saturn Girl, Wildfire, Sun Boy, Projectra, Shadow Lass, Cham & Brainiac Five to make short work out of even even an opposition who counted a Supes, Bats, TWO GLs, a Flash and Dr Fate among them, it's NOT surprising that in this case, the Legion lost: The odds were staked, heavily staked at that, against them from the moment on where they entered the JLA/JSA story. (And of course, Supes, Fate & GL would be formidable adversaries even if that small Legion squad operated at their full 100% efficiency, as opposed to being weakened to about 20% efficiency.)

You did? Great! Let's check it out!

To answer your original question: I would make it a 3-parter, similar to the Shazam!/JLA/JSA crossover, which felt more like an intercompany/Fawcett/DC crossover than some mere team-up.

First, let's decide who's in the teams. For the JLA, it will be the Big 7: Superman. Batman. Wonder Woman. The Flash. Green Lantern & Green Arrow. And the Black Canary.

The Justice Society: Dr Fate. The Huntress. Robin. Power Girl. The Star-Spangled Kid. Wildcat. And the Flash.

And the Legion: The Founders: Lightning Lad, Saturn Girl & Cosmic Boy. Brainiac Five, because he's so important to Legion mythology. Wildfire. Karate Kid. Timber Wolf.

Plus Dawnstar, Sun Boy, Phantom Girl, Element Lad, Shadow Lass, Mon-El, Chameleon Boy and Light Lass in supporting roles.

The main villain would be the Time Trapper, of course, since the SUPER FRIENDS comic book revealed that this character is unique in the DC universe: He sort of "bridges" the individual "mythoi" of Superman, the Legion, Superboy, the Super Friends (and hence, the Justice League), Green Lantern and even Wonder Woman, fusing them together.

Because he has, at one time or the other, fought Superman directly or indirectly, as well as Superboy, the Legion, the Justice League/Super Friends, the Wondertwins, the whole Green Lantern Corps and even Wonder Woman (in his earliest appearance yet, before he appeared in the Legion mythos as the Time Trapper).

The Trapper would enlist various Earth-1 and -2 villains: Shaddow Thief, Matter Master, Gentleman Ghost, Dr Light, the Shade, the Fiddler, Iccickle and so on, unleashing them on the Legion, while sending the Fatal Five against the JLA & JSA.

This would bring him into conflict with the Lord of Time.

Chronos, Per Degaton, and Time Trapper

I would have it that they were all aspects of the same being, the Time Trapper. He sets a plan in motion that will warp each world, in the time of the original JSA, the JLA , and the Legion. All of this to effect the changes that TT wants to take place to accomplish his goal of total entropy much earlier than it would happen naturally. TT is not human in any real sense, but instead the living embodiment of the void.

To do this, members from each team would be taken, each with a specific set of skills and powers, each manipulated into doing what he wants done.

Just my thoughts. Individual teams would come later in my thinking, but not necessarily the powerhouses from each team. They would be chosen for their butterfly effect.

The story was okay, not terrible but not great. IMO a very big reason it suffered was the lack of direction in the plot. Oh, Mordru can't get the three objects by themselves. Okay, let's pull heroes from the past. Oh, they got the things. Now he frees the demons. oops, they turn on Mordru, this is bad. Wait! Now they're fighting among each other! Oh drat, they're equally powerful. Wait, they're deputizing the teams? Gosh, who will win? Wait, the JLA aren't brainwashed so they're throwing the fight. Huh? I thought they were supposed to fight each other? Why are they sabotaging different landmarks now? Oh, they beat the demons somehow but I don't remember because I've lost interest by now and have gone off to read my current Legion comics.

The story really needs to be streamlined. As many others have suggested, I would stick to one central conflict instead of a series of villains and events clumsily thrown in one after the other. I would skip Mordru and just have the Demons Three already free, with each picking one team. Have the three teams clash. While they are fighting, a few heroes manage to shake off the brainwashing and free the others somehow (if they were brainwashed at all - the Legionnaires weren't because they sided with the altruistic demon, we could keep that).

Smaller team ups, between relevant characters, might fit better.

Some time-breaking mystical thingie requires Zatanna, Dr. Fate and the White Witch to work together (perhaps even throw in a magic user from the past, such as Arion of ancient Atlantis).

Time flows differently in the dimension of shadow, and Obsidian, Nightshade and Shadow Lass find themselves drawn into the dark universe to oppose some machinations of the Shadow Thief and / or the Shade.

That sort of thing would allow some serious focus on the modern day and future Legion characters being used.

Thanks to the Time Bubble, any Legionnaire has the ability to go back and deal with a crisis, revealing during that time that they wrote themselves a message in the past, which they have now read in the 31st century, telling them that they have to go back in time and help some 21st century allies! Paradox! Time travel shenanigans going all meta and incestuous and cheekily flipping causality the bird!

Dream Girl and Brainy lend themselves to that sort of thinking, but there's no reason Mon-El might not, in a head-scratcher, end up teaming up *with himself* 1000 years in the past (perhaps wearing some Sir Prize-riffic disguise to that past-him doesn't recognize future-him?

Karate Kid has already spent some time in the past (more than most), as have the Founders, Phantom Girl, Lotta Lu, Ultra Boy, etc. Any of them, even the newer batch (Element Lad, Quislet, Tellus, etc. 'recently' in the past pre-nu-52), could have 'left themselves messages, or be contacted by allies they made in the past, like the Thanagarian girlfriend that Dawnstar left her Flight Ring with!).

There totally needs to be some sort of Crisis on Infinite Starmen. How many are there, by now? I'm pretty sure the JSA, JLA and Legion have each had one!

It is an all time classic for me seeing as it was the first and only time all three of my all time favorite DC characters were on the same cover of a magazine. Green Lantern Hal Jordan, Green Lantern Alan Scott and Lightning Lad. They didn't interact much in the comic but it was awesome seeing them all together.

UPDATE: Having actually read this story now, I like the basic plot of the original. The execution could've been a lot better, however.