MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *cosmological*
Though Season Two's mythicity rates the same as that of Season One, the final season of LEGION OF SUPER-HEROES is more appealing in a kinetic sense. It's as if the producers realized in the first season that they couldn't duplicate the quirky appeal of the Legion-comics of the Silver Age and so switched to an approach more like that of the hyperviolent Image Comics of the 1990s.
The design for Two's "Big Bad," Imperiex, fairly screams "Image," but a new inductee to the hero-group-- a Superman-clone nicknamed "Superman X"-- is not much different, with his eyes all black cornea with green irises. Superman-X summons the 31st-century heroes to his era, that of the 41st century, to defeat the world-destroying tyrant Imperiex. Instead, the villain time-travels to the 31st century and begins a new reign of terror there, unleashing such familiar menaces as the Fatal Five and the Legion of Super-Villains. The Legion tries to compensate by bringing 21st-century Superman to their aid-- this time looking to be in his twenties rather than a teen. But Superman-X, with his Ahab-like obsession with stopping the future overlord, is the real "face of Superman" for the season.
There's a somewhat better usage of comics-plots than I found in Season One. The story of Timber Wolf's mutation by his ruthless scientist-father is extended by an adaptation of a story in which a different Legionnaire was accused of causing a death. In contrast, there's a completely original, and reasonably affecting, episode focusing on Lightning Lad and his two siblings. To be sure, though, said tale includes a comics-derived incident in which the aforementioned Legionnaire loses an arm and must have it replaced by a robot limb (a good fifteen years before Luke Skywalker suffered the same fate in EMPIRE STRIKES BACK).
The greater possibility of death increases the tension of the conflicts. As in the comics, Triplicate Girl loses one of her duplicates, which means that she must adjust to a new fighting-pattern, not to mention taking on a new cognomen. Superman-X is given a "would you kill Hitler as a child" moment, and Brainiac 5-- who as noted earlier is a humanoid computer rather than just a really smart guy-- has to confront his cyber-ancestor, the original Brainiac. There's also a little bit of Eros to balance the increase in Thanatos-- mostly in the suggestion of a thing between Saturn Girl and Lightning Lad-- though I still think the producers missed a beat by not building up the romantic element from the first. But as indicated above, the greater concentration of action-sequences is Season Two's biggest asset.
No comments:
Post a Comment