Four other writers are involved to a greater or lesser extent.Ĭonsequently, things are a bit up and down. There are only thirteen stories in this book, but Levitz writes just six of them on his own, and he's not involved at all in three of them. Levitz later admitted he was over-committed at the time, and this resulted in too many fill-in issues, with other writers involved to a greater or lesser extent. Levitz stepped down from writing the Legion in 1979 and didn't return till 1982, by which time he was on fire and he, with co-plotter and artist Keith Giffen, turned the book into arguably the best super-hero team book of the era. Some things worked, and some things didn't. Levitz was very young at this stage, and was still learning his chops as a writer.

Legion fans had always been continuity buffs, so it was a natural home for such efforts, and as writer Paul Levitz had emerged from Legion fandom, it seemed a good gig for him. The Legion, as compiled here, was one of the more successful attempts to Marvelise the DC line. Attempts to improve quality included what might be called 'Marvelisation' of the super-hero titles, with a focus on characterisation, continuity and subplots that had worked so well for Marvel since the mid-sixties but which had never bedded into DC, where the pre-Kahn management held onto their 'we know best' mindset despite ever-plummeting market share compared to the upstart Marvel. This book, compiling stories from 19, comes from an odd time for DC, when then-new publisher Jenette Kahn was trying to improve both the company's business model and the quality of their comics (spoiler alert: she succeeded in both, but it took a while). For anyone else, I'll try to provide a guide to the curious. Legion fans of a certain vintage are an obsessive, learned bunch who probably already know what they think of this book, and that's likely to be a favourable purchasing intention in the unlikely event they haven't bought it already.

Legion of superheroes paul levitz