Brainiac and the Legion of Super-Heroes, Part 1 Review

Adventure Comics #8
Superman: Last Stand of New Krypton #1
Supergirl #51
Superman #698
Adventure Comics #9
Superman: Last Stand of New Krypton #2

I was planning on putting up a review of this arc before now, but I found that I really don't have a lot to say about it. I haven't been following the Superman titles, and so there's a lot of this stuff that I really don't know or care about. Kryptonian politics? Yawn. But I might as well get to it.

What Happened That You Need to Know About

Uh, a lot of stuff. Apparently there's something called New Krypton now, ruled by General Zod, and Superman lives there, and Brainiac is threatening the place, and Superman and Mon-El and Supergirl and Superboy and all the Legionnaires in the 21st century are trying to fight him. Brainiac is on track to win this fight and kill Superman, which will throw off history and is creating rifts all over the 31st century, so Brainiac 5 comes back to do what he can to prevent that.

Review:

It's a perfectly acceptable crossover so far, with a good villain, a reasonable premise, passable art, complex and competing motivations for the heroes... the ingredients are all here. I'm happy with it.

As a Legion story, though...

It's like pretty much every other appearance of the retroboot Legion, really (especially Legion of 3 Worlds); the Legionnaires are definitely not the stars of the show here. I don't mind that in the sense that anything that increases the visibility of the Legion in preparation for their return to starring status in their own books is welcome, but it doesn't make these issues any better as Legion comics.

Having said that, Tellus's efforts to unite the competing guilds of Kryptonians is a very Legion kind of thing to happen in any story; they're not just there as wallpaper. (Compare the way that FC:L3W turned out to be pretty much a Legion story in the end.)

Notes:
- am I being too much of a purist or traditionalist or whatever if I say that Robinson and Gates really don't get how Quislet talks?
- all the stuff that was set up in the Adventure backups? R.J. Brande's will, and Element Lad as a chemistry teacher, and all that? The payoff on it could not possibly have been weaker.
- I count at least three Legionnaires who are on the scene who could basically defeat Brainiac all by themselves: Element Lad, Quislet, and Sensor Girl. In fact, the end of S:LSoNK #2 could be a big Sensor Girl ruse.

It's pretty good; it'll probably read well when it's all collected. I look forward to the rest of it, and I'll kick in another review when it's over.