Bendis taking legion from clark

[Jim Kelly]

I feel about Superboy (Clark Kent) the way I feel about Clara Oswald in DOCTOR WHO. I don't remember the Doctor's words exactly, but when Clara was taken away from him, even though he couldn't remember her, he said that you can still see the outline of the person by everyone and everything that surrounded their existence. There's so much of old school Superboy that's outlined by all that DC still retains, that he might as well exist, since he's the central persona that explains everything else around him.

[SiegePerilous02]

Similarly, if the Legion is an optimistic view of the future it makes much more sense for them to be inspired by things that we haven't seen happen yet than for them to be taking their lead from Superman-as-we-know-him. Sure, Jon hasn't done much to earn their admiration - but isn't that sort of the point? The Legion is proof that Superman is right, that things will work out, and that his way works - because they're from thousands of years in the future and grew up telling stories of the things the House Of El will accomplish on Earth in the coming decades.


All these changes make sense to me.

Wasn't that sort of always the case though? I thought his legend, encompassing what he was doing in the "present day" as Superman and what he would do in a hypothetical future, is what prompted them to go back in time so they could meet him as Superboy.

[llozymandias]

If I’m correct, it’s now:
Clark: original legion
Kon-El: Zero hour Legion
Kara: Threeboot legion
Jon: Rebirth Legion?

I can very easily accept this setup.

[daBronzeBomma]

All this does is further fuel my desire for The Next Hard Reboot to arrive sooner rather than later.

Jon had a great start (literally the only way Supes was going to have a flesh and blood offspring and also raise him in this continuity), had a perfect playmate (Damian Wayne), and could have been an 11- year-old for several years real-time and could have really "earned" a lot of goodwill.

Then Bendis showed up and destroyed the character.

I will never accept his reasoning for having Jon be captured and physically abused by someone who looked just like his father FOR YEARS AND YEARS in-story just to "show how strong his spirit is". No, Bendis continues to make Lois and Clark look like the universe's most stupid parents by trusting a wildly unstable Jor-El and ....

You know what? Forget it. Forget Jon. Ship him off to the Legion and have Lois & Clark forget they ever had a son.

Bendis clearly hated the Super nuclear family and did his best to break them up. And he succeeded. No one has the power to tell him no.

Jon is ruined for me. And short of Bendis (or the next writer) undoing the age-up, I think I'm done with the character.

Oh, and hate the change of LOSH inspiration from Clark to Jon.

[Superlad93]

In all fairness, I can't say I love it yet. Haven't seen enough to get how the dynamic is going to work. But I can say that conceptually it works for me quite a bit. I dig that this still very much opens up Superman for team-ups with the Legion, and creating some form of a dynamic there. I'm so very there for Clark as President of Earth, and him helping to build the UP in the present. And quite frankly, I was really charmed by the idea of hearing out a young person on the grandest stage possible, and putting their ideas into action. That genuinely spoke to me as an incredibly relevant idea.

And I particularly liked the idea of bookending the saga with having Jon scared about what his future would hold and getting rejected by the Teen Titans, and then now hearing about how he'll be remembered in the future and being asked to join the Legion. That was pretty cool to me.

[DragonPiece]

And I particularly liked the idea of bookending the saga with having Jon scared about what his future would hold and getting rejected by the Teen Titans, and then now hearing about how he'll be remembered in the future and being asked to join the Legion. That was pretty cool to me.

Never thought of it like that, that actually is good character development Bendis did there, I hope he references Jon's feelings about the titan's rejecting in one of the future issues.

[HsssH]

I voted that I'm ok with it, but I don't really like it, I just felt like "hate it" is a bit too strong option for how I feel.

I didn't really like Jon when he was introduced into the continuity. But Tomasi did great job with his development and especially pairing him up with Damian. Supersons for a while was one of my favourite monthly comics. But then Bendis happened and I haven't liked anything that he did with Jon. I'm not speaking about character moments like that mentioned bookending with Teen Titans and Legion, it was cool. But as far as the big ideas go I think that everything that he did is bad long term for the character. So you know, it is just another bad decision in a series of bad decisions. Now it feels like Supersons was just a "fluke" and I was right all along for initially disliking Jon.

Honestly biggest issue for me here is that Jon isn't his own character. He is getting stuff from his father and basically doing what his father did decades ago. It is not something new, Bendis is just giving Legion story a new paint, but it doesn't really push Legion, nor Jon, forward. They'll just be doing stuff that has already happened many times, but this time with Jon. At this point it feels like every time Legion returns they get a new origin or some big change to how they work. It just further divides their fanbase that isn't that big in the first place.

And sure, it doesn't help Superman either that his key history bits are removed and given to other characters. In the end I think it is a negative for everyone involved: Jon, Legion and Superman.

[Superlad93]

Never thought of it like that, that actually is good character development Bendis did there, I hope he references Jon's feelings about the titan's rejecting in one of the future issues.

Hey actually already did back in issue 7 of Superman. But maybe in issue 16 before Jon tells Damian about the Legion, Damian will make a joke about how he can't say he's too young to be a Teen Titan anymore, then Jon goes "right....there's something else I gotta tell."

[Tzigone]

I don't want either one of them as a member of the Legion. I like the Legion in their time, and each of our heroes in theirs.

I dislike this because it's just reducing Jon to a Clark-fill-in, in a narrative sense. It diminishes the character.

I really hate Jon being the inspiration (rather than Clark) and don't like him having the UP idea, either.

[Kuwagaton]

At this point you have to laugh at whatever Doomsday Clock was supposed to be. The major plot gaffes and patchwork plots for the Superman line alone makes the idea of saving us from the New 52 ironic.

Clark and the Legion to me is just a thing about nostalgia. He's a forty year old man with his own setting and a JL membership, let someone else get a taste. I did like the idea of a play on Hook where Jack became the new Peter so to speak, but not taking this chance to do a new Legion and commit to it seems like a huge mistake based on advanced stage nostalgia. It's safe to say these franchises don't need more of a connection than we're getting here for a crack at notable success.

In the revolving IP door we know full well that Jon can literally be dead and gone within five or six years, so this helps. It was pretty inevitable after the aging that I initially found dreadful. It's almost back to being a narrative problem depending on next issue: Clark trusted his son with his own father and it turned out so rough, now these unknown faux hawkers want to take him a thousand years into the future. How well is Bendis going to work that? I came in here thinking the same thing as Superlad about his character arc since Man of Steel, but that's undercut by the fact that he's changed so dramatically isn't it? Like "finding a place where I fit in" doesn't mean what it should if you change to the point where you would have fit in anywhere in the first place.

[manwhohaseverything]

At this point you have to laugh at whatever Doomsday Clock was supposed to be. The major plot gaffes and patchwork plots for the Superman line alone makes the idea of saving us from the New 52 ironic.

Clark and the Legion to me is just a thing about nostalgia. He's a forty year old man with his own setting and a JL membership, let someone else get a taste. I did like the idea of a play on Hook where Jack became the new Peter so to speak, but not taking this chance to do a new Legion and commit to it seems like a huge mistake based on advanced stage nostalgia. It's safe to say these franchises don't need more of a connection than we're getting here for a crack at notable success.

In the revolving IP door we know full well that Jon can literally be dead and gone within five or six years, so this helps. It was pretty inevitable after the aging that I initially found dreadful. It's almost back to being a narrative problem depending on next issue: Clark trusted his son with his own father and it turned out so rough, now these unknown faux hawkers want to take him a thousand years into the future. How well is Bendis going to work that? I came in here thinking the same thing as Superlad about his character arc since Man of Steel, but that's undercut by the fact that he's changed so dramatically isn't it? Like "finding a place where I fit in" doesn't mean what it should if you change to the point where you would have fit in anywhere in the first place.

@bold The crazy thing is bendis is the one reassuring everyone that this legion book and millennium thing will tie into doomsday clock.
I got a feeling that jon would be gone like chris the minute the efed up supersons. Man! What a waste!

[Superlad93]

Kuwagaton, I maintain that the only mistake with Jon's aging was the actual execution of issues 7-10, and how ill advised it was to impart that info in a truncated 4 issues. This being compounded by the fact that his experiences in space are directly responsible for the resolution of this whole arc. But conceptually I stand by it as we currently know it. The concept of the character arc is strong. It's a textbook hero's journey entrenched in Superman lore. Capping it off with inspiring the Legion and joining them is, in my opinion, quite powerful.

And again, I think a group of future teen heroes being inspired a young person just like them who got their voice and ideas heard on the largest stage possible is genuinely something powerful and true to life. If that's my trade off for no longer having the Legion as, and lets all be honest here, Superman dust accumulating trophy, then I'd good with it. He's still in a perfect position to go on adventures with them once in a while, so outside of just getting to say he used to be a member there's not much functional loss here.

[Yoda]

I honestly don’t get the thought process behind “we’re going to relaunch LoSH with a legitimate Superboy, son of Superman, that has had appearances in cartoons, a likely appearance in the most ambitious superhero television event ever, and costars in our young adult lineup of graphic novels which are the central focus of expanding our publishing framework for the future” all as some long con to erase him. Legitimately, in what world does that make sense?

Chris Kent was a plot device for one arc of a storyline. Jon’s going on four years and has been one of the driving narrative focus in Superman for the entire time and is launching a major push to reestablish a legacy series for DC Comics. But yeah, it’s all to ruin him and erase him.

[Yoda]

Kuwagaton, I maintain that the only mistake with Jon's aging was the actual execution of issues 7-10, and how ill advised it was to impart that info in a truncated 4 issues. This being compounded by the fact that his experiences in space are directly responsible for the resolution of this whole arc. But conceptually I stand by it as we currently know it. The concept of the character arc is strong. It's a textbook hero's journey entrenched in Superman lore. Capping it off with inspiring the Legion and joining them is, in my opinion, quite powerful.

And this is something that could easily be corrected through miniseries which I still think it possible. It's narratively too rich to just leave sitting on a shelf. We still haven't heard of any of the second round of Wonder Comics titles beyond Naomi and the extensions of Wonder Twins and Dial H.

[Blue22]

I hope he references Jon's feelings about the titan's rejecting in one of the future issues.

I'm just hoping Jon (or Bendis) eventually remembers why the Titans told him no.