Legion Lost #3 Review

What Happened That You Have to Know About:

The Legionnaires pursue a hypersapien who's been hypertaxed into some kind of Okaaran beastie. Timber Wolf catches up with it in a mall and fights it; turns out it's Yera trying to harvest Durlan DNA from her victims to reconstitute herself. And it seems Timber Wolf has caught the virus himself and it's given him disturbing new powers.

Review:

Lots of stuff in this issue I don't like. I don't like Brin shooting his claws across the room; ew. And I don't like Yera killing people, whether she's in her right mind or not. But then I'm not supposed to like it, and it doesn't make this a bad comic. It's just what the Legion has to deal with.

Nicieza's getting a lot of compliments for this thing he's doing where he rotates the POV to a different character with each issue. It's a perfectly reasonable way of doing things, but I don't see what's so revolutionary about it. To me it doesn't really work in this issue as well as it could, because it feels like we're getting so much of Tellus's point of view.

But, still, what can we learn about Nicieza's view of Timber Wolf from this issue? He's angry a lot of the time. He's a loner and he has a strong pack instinct; wonder how that works. He's the guy in the group who challenges Tyroc's leadership (interesting; you'd think that'd be Wildfire's natural role, but Wildfire didn't do much of that in his spotlight issue). He's animalistic enough to lick blood off a corpse without getting skeeved out. He's not dumb.

Part of Nicieza's intent seems to be to box these Legionnaires in, to put them in a situation where their options are severely constrained: can't go home, can't call for help, Presumably he's got something in mind of the form, "...and when the Legionnaires are in such a situation, here's what they'll do!" And in the meantime we are getting characterization and setup and action and stuff. So in this case I'd have to say that my nagging feeling of not-enough-comic-book probably comes from the fact that it's only 20 pages.

Getting back to Yera for a second. Okay, so she's still alive, and trying to get over what the hypertaxis virus did to her. Very good. And for all I know she's not even really herself now; she's this weird Okaaran monster. But the Okaaran monster has killed people; to what extent has Yera killed people? Legion code against killing, guys; this is serious. Of course, there's a lot about how this works that we don't know. Do you keep your mind when you hypertaxi to another form? The experiences of Dr. Scanlon and Timber Wolf suggest that you do. So what's Yera's excuse? Out of her tree from being cut in half, or whatever? Okaaran Rdrayyjes are killing machines whether they like it or not? This is one of those plot developments that, if treated properly, is going to be with us for a while.

Sorry; I've got a cold and am not at my reviewing best. It's entirely possible that I've missed a bunch of really cogent points about this issue but, if so, they ain't coming to me tonight. I need some sleep.

Notes:
- I like Tellus's human-illusion form
- what's-her-head on page 1, panel 3; she's going to be a recurring character. You can see it in the marks on her face
- Nicieza is casting Dawnstar as a perfectionist. I think that's a good call
- to spell it out for anyone who didn't pick up on it: "Red Rage" = "Rdrayyj"
- "I'm tasty delicious."

Art: 96 panels/20 pages = 4.8 panels/page. One two-page spread of 17 panels.

Thing about Pete Woods? He sometimes outlines things weird. Check it out; he gets some interesting effects.