“Yesterday’s” Comic> Legion Of Super-Heroes #0

The only character rebooted more times than these three is Donna Troy.

Legion Of Super-Heroes #0

DC Comics (October, 1994)

“Time And Chance”

WRITERS: Mark Waid & Tom McCraw

ARTISTS: Stuart Immonen & Ron Boyd

COLORIST: Tom McCraw

LETTERER: Bob Pinaha

ASSISTANT EDITOR: Mike McAvennie

EDITOR: KC Carlson

It’s the 30th Century. The planets of the galaxy are trying to form a United Planets, a sort of space UN. Rokk Krinn, Magnoball star who is about to learn his manager is embezzling from him, Garth Ranzz, a drifter searching for his missing brother, and Imra Ardeen, a telepath who is joining the Science Patrol on Earth, are traveling with the man who made the UP possible, R.J. Brande, the creator of the stargate that speeds up space travel. Someone wants him dead but the trio manage to save his life using the unique gifts of their respective planets as well as a courage that inspires Brande to bring them together as something missing for a long time: super-heroes!

What they got right: Legion Of Super-Heroes has an inherent problem as the future of the shared DC Universe that requires it to be rebooted often, to the dismay of the title’s fans, and DC reboots the main continuity too much as it is. But taking the opportunity of the Zero Hour to do it makes a kind of sense, and this is a good introduction to new fans. They’re interesting characters who aren’t best friends at the moment but you can see the potential for what they became in previous continuities.

What they got wrong: The reveal of the guy who is supposed to be sending the assassins after Brande, Lord Doyle, is handled like he’s a character we’ve seen before. Unless you’ve watched the previous incarnations of the 30th Century, you haven’t seen him before here. Legionnaires #0, which we’ll look at next week, continues from this issue.

Recommendation: I don’t know where this series went after this but it’s a good re-start. The problem is trying to get attached to this series because it’s restarted so often to match where the “modern-day” DC titles have gone. It might be a good place to start otherwise if you want to commit to this continuity.