What are the chances that Bendis restores Clark's LSH past in the JL Annual?

[Vordan]

So every Super character is going to have his/her/their own Legion?

Pretty much already did. Clark had Pre-Crisis and the Retroboot. Kara had Pre-Crisis and the Waidboot. Kon had the 5YL Legion and the Retroboot I believe. Now Jon gets the Bendisboot. Looks like the Bendis take will be the one that sticks unless the show doesn’t get made or flops however.

[HsssH]

No, I mean if everyone now gets it in the same continuity? Because my impression was that currently only Jon had Legion.

[Vordan]

No, I mean if everyone now gets it in the same continuity? Because my impression was that currently only Jon had Legion.

Ah my bad. No as far as we know the only Legion people know of in-universe is Jon’s. There was the whole “everyone remembers everything!” at the end of Death Metal but DC only uses that to cherry pick old continuity they want to use, so nothing really changed. Far as we know Clark never met a Legion as a kid, and Kara/Kon have no relationship with the Legion either.

[Sacred Knight]

You're one of those glass half empty kinda guys, aren't you?

I look at it this way. Bendis himself didn't want his LSH to be a reboot. It being a reboot wasn't particularly popular with a lot of fans so there's no upside to sticking with, presumably, Didio's decision to retcon away all previous LSHs when they could easily co-exist as previous incarnations of the team from alternate futures, which Bendis has already established in his LSH run. Furthermore, DC currently has a stated policy of "Everything Happened" in terms of its continuity, which actually means they're just not going to get too specific about the exact details so that fans can fill in the blanks however they want. Clark has a Legion Flight Ring at his Fortress of Solitude. Clark was a fixture of the LSH for decades and removing him from their history was deeply unpopular and caused countless problems for the franchise long-term.

So, what possible reason would Bendis have for not acknowledging that Clark was once part of an earlier incarnation of the LSH at this point? How would that help make Clark's story more interesting? Or Jon's? Or Kara's?

DC has been around and around the whole "All those stories never happened, but these ones did" thing before and it didn't work out very well for them, particularly in regards to the Legion. And Bendis said so when his LSH was first announced. He specifically said that it was not going to invalidate any of the wonderful stuff that Waid, Giffen, or Levitz had done, which is why he planned to set in the 32nd Century.

But, sure, if you want to believe it's just Jon's ring and nothing more, go ahead. I, on the other hand, tend to favor the idea that Bendis is offering an olive branch to fans like myself who enjoyed his new LSH, but were miffed that it was yet another reboot.

I appreciate the optimism and absolutely hope you're right. But on the other hand I take into consideration the era we're in. Jon's hijacked the lore pretty fully by this point; per their actions as far as DC is concerned its his world right now and Clark's just living with the leftovers. I wouldn't be half surprised if its Jon's ring since he's of course "inheriting" the Fortress too. But again, really hope you're the one who's right. I'll find it hard to be optimistic about anything regarding Superman till the Crisis hits though. I know relying on that in of itself is on a wing and a prayer, considering the messes prior Crises have created and that the minds behind the Infinite Frontier gaffe will still be behind it.

[Last Son of Krypton]

I assumed Clark's past with the Legion was already restored for the umpteenth time after DDC's last issue.

[Bored at 3:00AM]

The beauty of DC's current approach towards continuity is that fans are largely free to interpret DCU history however we want. If you prefer a more all-encompasing vision of the DCU that includes all the various alternate versions, you can do that. Or, if you prefer a more streamlined version of DCU history, you can do that, too.

Neither is fundamentally better or worse than the other. It really depends upon the story you want to tell.

[HsssH]

We always could do that with headcanon and fanfiction.

[Sutekh]

Even putting aside how the reboots have divided people, the obsession with diversity in the modern era means that I suspect the old Legions are never coming back. Too white and homogeneous.

Just use more Tyroc, Invisible Jacques and his sister Computo, Myg/Karate Kid 2, Dragonwing, Chemical Kid, Glorith, XS, GEAR, Kid Quantum 2, Dragonmage, Catspaw, etc. All the diverse Legionnaires that Bendis *chose not to use.*

Yes, the first 25 or so were white (and occasionally blue, green or orange), but in the last fifty years, over a dozen diverse Legionnaires have been introduced, and Bendis carefully hopped, skipped and jumped over them to pick out only the white M&Ms.

[Bored at 3:00AM]

We always could do that with headcanon and fanfiction.

Definitely, but previous editorial regimes made that more complicated by going out of their way to codify the DCU with year by year timelines and stories set in the past to fill gaps left by retcons nobody liked to begin with.

These days, we have less of that stuff to ignore because no one seems interested in nailing down any specific dates that'll end up being rewritten sooner or later anyway. And most of the dumb retcons have all been reversed or ignored

[Thor-Ul]

And most of the dumb retcons have all been reversed or ignored

The future of Bendislegion then.

[Bored at 3:00AM]

The future of Bendislegion then.

It really depends upon the success or failure of the HBO Max cartoon. If that's well-received, I don't see the current incarnation of the team going anywhere for a while.

Of course, it'll eventually be supplanted by another LSH, but hopefully that one won't repeat the mistake of pretending that the prior incarnations never existed

[Vordan]

Well Johns seems to be teasing the return of prior Legions:



That bit about the Legion seems to be teasing a Legion of Four Worlds story which could bring back the Johns Retroboot. Of course it could be another Johns tease that goes nowhere.

[Zero Hunter]

Pretty much already did. Clark had Pre-Crisis and the Retroboot. Kara had Pre-Crisis and the Waidboot. Kon had the 5YL Legion and the Retroboot I believe. Now Jon gets the Bendisboot. Looks like the Bendis take will be the one that sticks unless the show doesn’t get made or flops however.

Clark - original and retroboot
Kara - original and Waidboot
Conner - Zero Hour Reboot
Jon - Bendisboot

[Bored at 3:00AM]

Well Johns seems to be teasing the return of prior Legions:



That bit about the Legion seems to be teasing a Legion of Four Worlds story which could bring back the Johns Retroboot. Of course it could be another Johns tease that goes nowhere.

What's this from?

[Vordan]

What's this from?

Preview for Flashpoint Beyond, Johns’ sequel to Flashpoint that he’s doing starting in April