Legion of Super Heroes #1 preview

[BroHomo]

Thousand years was such a sticking point. He shouldn't even be a karate kid.it's not. I have corrected a person in this very thread who thought neji, hinata.. Etc represent Japanese culture. They have their basis is chinese culture .
People who like these sort of nonsense. Like them, but don't tell me how it's some grand jesture to acknowledge other cultures. Its not. Its tone deaf nonesense. Not even one reference of the Japanese culture in his design. Smh!

I think you're giving American readers too much credi

[manwhohaseverything]

I think you're giving American readers too much credi

Ignorance i have no issue with. I love it when people learn and grow including myself . Like the neji situation i mentioned.i might be wrong on things as well. I would have stayed away from it as well, because its not my place. But, people started defending it as some grand reference.

[CaptCleghorn]

Ignorance i have no issue with. I love it when people learn and grow including myself . Like the neji situation i mentioned.i might be wrong on things as well. I would have stayed away from it as well, because its not my place. But, people started defending it as some grand reference.

True. What I actually know about Asian martial arts history is minimal and tainted by current pop culture. The fact that "Karate" is a cool word which sounds good, is fun to say, and gives us some idea of what the character can do is enough for me. Race, style, costuming should have a little more research done. But then again, all charcters need background research.

As for Dawnstar, my knowledge of native American dress and culture is more than my knowledge of Asian martial arts. But even that is due to my son, who has done considerable work (for a teenage boy) researching the style of dress and dance of tribes and where these tribes lived. I know parts of the dress were very important and others added by pop culture to look "indian". Star Trek's done a good job of covering these kind of dress with Bajoran and Klingon items and regalia. The idea is there and being all made up, doesn't need to worry about accuracy.

It is a tough job. Characters who were created in the sixties and seventies with racial and ethnic qualities which were acceptable then, but frowned upon now should be updated. Black and Asian characters from the Golden Age have had the same struggle and managed to dwell in the present day. Dawnie and Karate Kid (among others) need the same updating.

[Midnight_v]

Ignorance i have no issue with. I love it when people learn and grow including myself . Like the neji situation i mentioned.i might be wrong on things as well. I would have stayed away from it as well, because its not my place. But, people started defending it as some grand reference.

I really appreciate your posts.

I'm going to say I've agreed with everything you've said. I'd MUCH rather have a White super hero than a Lil' Black Sambo depicted super-hero. Just... hell no.

Frankly, the amount of "Chinese, Japanese... Karate, Kung-fu... Whateva!" popping up here. and finally the... "youre more likely to be in martial arts, if you're from asia than in wales".
In know its probably unintentional casual racism but damn, thats pretty unsubtle even for this place.

Aside from that. . . I think its a mistake to NOT try to keep the loyalists fanbase, even if you expand the roster. You're not going to please everybody, no, but what good is a reboot if you're not at least
gathering up all the people that were carrying torches for the book to come out.
Get them on board as best as reasonable, write an great story and legion will start getting bought up by word of mouth. I never thought I'd buy a Mr.Miracle book till the last run but thats how they got me.
Oh well. . . I'll hold off for a few issues of the run and see how its developing before picking up. It'd be pretty dope if they listened to people on a few things.

[Korath]

I really appreciate your posts.

I'm going to say I've agreed with everything you've said. I'd MUCH rather have a White super hero than a Lil' Black Sambo depicted super-hero. Just... hell no.

Frankly, the amount of "Chinese, Japanese... Karate, Kung-fu... Whateva!" popping up here. and finally the... "youre more likely to be in martial arts, if you're from asia than in wales".
In know its probably unintentional casual racism but damn, thats pretty unsubtle even for this place.

Aside from that. . . I think its a mistake to NOT try to keep the loyalists fanbase, even if you expand the roster. You're not going to please everybody, no, but what good is a reboot if you're not at least
gathering up all the people that were carrying torches for the book to come out.
Get them on board as best as reasonable, write an great story and legion will start getting bought up by word of mouth. I never thought I'd buy a Mr.Miracle book till the last run but thats how they got me.
Oh well. . . I'll hold off for a few issues of the run and see how its developing before picking up. It'd be pretty dope if they listened to people on a few things.

There is one big flaw in your logical. There is no appeasing those older fans. they want their Legion/Green Lantern/X, whatever it may means and any departure from it is met with a frothing mouth. And no amount of explanation than things need to change to sell a book which already floundered will change their minds.

Like the fact that Karate Kid wear a traditional Mandchu hairstyle, not a chinese one. it was imposed on the ethnic Han in China under their last imperial dynasty because it was a Mandchu dynasty, but it wasn't a chinese way to wear their hair.

[manwhohaseverything]

Like the fact that Karate Kid wear a traditional Mandchu hairstyle, not a chinese one. it was imposed on the ethnic Han in China under their last imperial dynasty because it was a Mandchu dynasty, but it wasn't a chinese way to wear their hair.

explain to how half Japanese guy should be related to the qing or the hans?manchu still folds under chinese culture as far as i know. I might be wrong. I mean, tamils and punjabi both fold under indian cultures.

[Jim Kelly]

If everyone with any European genes can claim Charlemagne as a common ancestor now, what will it be like in a thousand years? I'd argue that, in the DCU, most people on Earth, and maybe many of the United Planets, will have Clark Kent as a common ancestor.

The idea of race (which even now is a social fiction) shouldn't really exist in a thousand years, because of so many people around the world mating with one another. Or maybe totally new ethnicities will arise unlike the national identities that people claim today.

[manwhohaseverything]

If everyone with any European genes can claim Charlemagne as a common ancestor now, what will it be like in a thousand years? I'd argue that, in the DCU, most people on Earth, and maybe many of the United Planets, will have Clark Kent as a common ancestor.

The idea of race (which even now is a social fiction) shouldn't really exist in a thousand years, because of so many people around the world mating with one another. Or maybe totally new ethnicities will arise unlike the national identities that people claim today.

Again, race isn't what were talking about, culture is. It sometimes takes a long time a for a culture to die out. Yes, even a 1000 years might not be enough .And the designers don't do any of what you said. They are depicting an old ethnicity and conflating with an other culture and ethnicity entirely . But, i like the observation of outcome of mixing. Its promising.

[Scott Taylor]

There is one big flaw in your logical. There is no appeasing those older fans. they want their Legion/Green Lantern/X, whatever it may means and any departure from it is met with a frothing mouth. And no amount of explanation than things need to change to sell a book which already floundered will change their minds.

Like the fact that Karate Kid wear a traditional Mandchu hairstyle, not a chinese one. it was imposed on the ethnic Han in China under their last imperial dynasty because it was a Mandchu dynasty, but it wasn't a chinese way to wear their hair.

Manchuria has a long history of Japanese occupation, right?

[Tazpocalapse]

Is it possible that some Legion member designs maybe drawn from the perspective of certain characters paying homage to aspects of the characters and being a social norm for some groups. Perhaps in this future a blending of cultures now has more cultural connection on Earth that is now inhabited by Alien?

[Jackalope89]

In short;
Karate Kid in the new Legion is drawn in the way of an old, and bad, stereotype that isn't even Japanese in culture (and they can be very touchy about getting their cultures mixd up like that).
The Legion book for many, has started off poorly (even for a number of those that had been anticipating it).
Karate is not a catch all term in regards to martial arts. In fact, in this day and age, a quick google search is all that's needed to clarify that. And trying to defend it as a catch all term nowadays does no one any good.

[Sutekh]

Again, race isn't what were talking about, culture is. It sometimes takes a long time a for a culture to die out. Yes, even a 1000 years might not be enough. And the designers don't do any of what you said. They are depicting an old ethnicity and conflating with an other culture and ethnicity entirely. But, i like the observation of outcome of mixing. Its promising.

Yeah, China's been around, and pretty much monolithic, for three thousand years. I doubt it will be indistinguishable from Japan 1000 years from now...

That said, this is a new character, who, for all we know, *could be Chinese.* (I mean, if Lightning Lad is now black, who's to say?)

Sure, he's called 'Karate Kid,' but all of the words we are reading are translated from Interlac, so it could just be handwaved away as a bad translation, and 'Karate' is just shorthand for 'Martial Arts in General.' (Which would be technically more accurate anyway, since he's never been just a 'karate' master, so much as a master of *many* martial arts, including some from alien worlds, as demonstrated in an early appearance when he used a 'Klenarian muscle lock' on Superboy, which was absurd, but hilarious.)

Until we know what the designer of the character had in mind with the style and the name, it's all just a tempest in a teapot. Sure, he *might* have been clueless culturally (and yeah, that seems all too likely, given past precedent...), but he might have put some actual thought into it, and then had the usual no time at all to actually explain anything, with thirty-some Legionnaires (and Jon, and Rose) to squeeze onto the page.

1000 years from now, I wonder if the vast majority of humanity won't be generically brown, and light-colored hair, eyes and skin won't be vanishingly rare. It would certainly give us one less thing to squabble over (although it shouldn't matter in a universe full of aliens with wildly different body types to be the 'other').

A world in the UP that's *deliberately* racially blended, and everyone kind of (creepily?) looks the same, could be funky. Maybe even a world where exaggerated gender differences are downplayed, and everyone is more or less androgynous, and gender identity is 'whatever' could be a similarly head-turning world for someone from the 21st century to visit. Particularly in a future society where reproduction no longer requires biology (want a kid? Go to the doctor and have one grown from your DNA. Come back next week to pick up your baby.). Jon, "Uh, I'm sorry, should I call you mister or miss..." Androgyne, "We don't do that here. Call me Fen, it's my name."

[Jim Kelly]

Again, race isn't what were talking about, culture is. It sometimes takes a long time a for a culture to die out. Yes, even a 1000 years might not be enough .And the designers don't do any of what you said. They are depicting an old ethnicity and conflating with an other culture and ethnicity entirely . But, i like the observation of outcome of mixing. Its promising.

Yeah, I wasn't trying to construct an apology for whatever is going on in the comic books. I was just wool gathering about what could possibly happen in the future. Things I've thought about before. Cultures aren't static and with greater communication and more political upheaval, who knows what the world could be like in a thousand years (if human civilization survives that long) or how demographics will shift.

In THE MARTIAN CHRONICLES, one of Bradbury's stories has the Earthlings become Martians when they land on Mars, replacing the native population that was killed off.

The sad thing about the Legion of Super-Heroes is that there's too much effort to make everything resemble the world we're in now, rather than pushing the bounds of speculative fiction and presenting mind blowing ideas about the farflung future.

[manwhohaseverything]

Manchuria has a long history of Japanese occupation, right?

It occupied it the 30s. Unless, they weave that into the legion story. I don't think it's relevant.

[manwhohaseverything]

Yeah, China's been around, and pretty much monolithic, for three thousand years. I doubt it will be indistinguishable from Japan 1000 years from now...

That said, this is a new character, who, for all we know, *could be Chinese.* (I mean, if Lightning Lad is now black, who's to say?)

Sure, he's called 'Karate Kid,' but all of the words we are reading are translated from Interlac, so it could just be handwaved away as a bad translation, and 'Karate' is just shorthand for 'Martial Arts in General.' (Which would be technically more accurate anyway, since he's never been just a 'karate' master, so much as a master of *many* martial arts, including some from alien worlds, as demonstrated in an early appearance when he used a 'Klenarian muscle lock' on Superboy, which was absurd, but hilarious.)

Until we know what the designer of the character had in mind with the style and the name, it's all just a tempest in a teapot. Sure, he *might* have been clueless culturally (and yeah, that seems all too likely, given past precedent...), but he might have put some actual thought into it, and then had the usual no time at all to actually explain anything, with thirty-some Legionnaires (and Jon, and Rose) to squeeze onto the page.

1000 years from now, I wonder if the vast majority of humanity won't be generically brown, and light-colored hair, eyes and skin won't be vanishingly rare. It would certainly give us one less thing to squabble over (although it shouldn't matter in a universe full of aliens with wildly different body types to be the 'other').

A world in the UP that's *deliberately* racially blended, and everyone kind of (creepily?) looks the same, could be funky. Maybe even a world where exaggerated gender differences are downplayed, and everyone is more or less androgynous, and gender identity is 'whatever' could be a similarly head-turning world for someone from the 21st century to visit. Particularly in a future society where reproduction no longer requires biology (want a kid? Go to the doctor and have one grown from your DNA. Come back next week to pick up your baby.). Jon, "Uh, I'm sorry, should I call you mister or miss..." Androgyne, "We don't do that here. Call me Fen, it's my name."

I can get behind this.but, dc's track record isn't great regarding these things.
To everyone Again, i apologies if i have overstepped my boundaries and being persistent.