The Review 52: Legion Lost 1

When DC made the decision to re-launch most of their current issues in a major event known as “The New 52”, I made the assumption that certain things would happen. In regards to Legion Lost #1, apparently many of my assumptions were wrong. Right off the bat, I expected this event to make new series more accessible to new readers. Legion Lost did not accomplish this. The only real experience I have ever had with Legion has been through the Smallville television show, and as such I was told just enough for the already thinly stretched plot of the episode to make sense (don’t get me wrong, I loved the shit out of Smallville, but come on). Because of this, I was almost excited to read this issue, to have the opportunity to learn more about a superhero team from the future. Unfortunately Legion Lost maintained exactly zero of the expectations that I had held for it, and I am a little bit disappointed that I have to hate on a new DC publication so hard.

The story begins with a strange and very unhealthy looking individual screaming at doctors at a hospital. Almost immediately, the scene cuts to 29 hours after the “release” of some unknown pathogen. A collection of superheroes appear out of thin air riding a time bubble, which proceeds to crash and mess with some of the heroes powers. This is explained using dialect that clearly originated in the 31st century, and it is barely discernable that their vessel is broken. This immediately alienated me, as it was made incredibly apparent that I had nothing in common with any of these characters. One could argue that a person such as myself with a fragile frame and a mind often clouded by alcohol wouldn’t have much in common with any superhero, however what I mean is that all of these characters were incredibly bland. The finest display of personality occurs when Dawnstar hurls in a bush. For the sake of avoiding spoilers, I won’t delve into any more events that fail to garner sympathy from the reader, but they certainly occur. The dialect is really cheesy at some points, and it is made apparent that the word “Fuck” in the 31st century has evolved into “Sprock”. I would almost bet 5 bucks that that exact word has been used in the Jetson’s as well at some point (Sprock the Jetson’s, it was a terrible cartoon). Ultimately the writing leads the unfamiliar reader nowhere, and by the end of the issue most of the heroes haven’t even moved from their landing zone. Honestly, I was terribly underwhelmed. Perhaps those with greater background knowledge can appreciate some elements of this issue more, and of that I cannot comment.

Art-wise, this issue had some ups and downs. I enjoyed the extreme perspectives that artist Pete Woods included during some of the action sequences, it’s one thing that’s quite difficult and really satisfying to pull off when drawing human (or at least somewhat bipedal) figures. The rest of the art was pretty standard and maybe a little cluttered at times. I also had some issues with the faces of many of the characters, which seemed to portray as much emotion as the many Lego advertisements contained inside (which is to say, very little). Not a very strong issue artistically.

Overall this comic was a letdown. I don’t see how writer Fabian Nicieza could have viewed this work in a positive light. As I am always optimistic about the future of comics, I really hope we see something more brought to this series, but after this poor debut it’s hard to see any comic fan coming back to check and
see.

Final Score: 1/5