Unca Cheeks the Toy Wonder's Silver Age Comics Web Site!

Death -- as we shall soon see -- was a major component of the Silver Age LEGION canon; more so, in fact, than it was for virtually any other ongoing mainstream comics series, before or since.

Along with the demise and subsequent resurrection of Lightning Lad, referenced earlier... we have the example of the way, waaaaaayy ahead of its time COOL MOMENT, PART SIX: "I Didn't Even Know The Finger Was Loaded, For Chrissakes -- !" (i.e., "The Legionnaire Who KILLED!"; ADVENTURE COMICS #342).

The next time you find yourself confronted (as is, sadly, seemingly all but inevitable, nowadays) by some cheerfully smug and insufferable little Silver Age-bashing know-nothing, blandly asserting that the comics of that bygone era were shallow and simplistic... hit the silly twit upside his pointed little head with this one: longtime Legion stalwart Star Boy -- he of the ability to increase the weight and/or mass of any object or individual -- is ambushed by the jealous ex-paramour of one Nura Nal (a.k.a., the alluring seeress [and future Legionnaire] known as Dream Girl); Star Boy's current Regular Saturday Night Thang.

In a desperate, last-ditch attempt to keep from ending up as spandex-wrapped worm chow -- and with his own super-power's usefulness having been negated by his cunning foeman -- the stricken Legionnaire is forced to utilize an unfamiliar hand weapon in self-defense, ultimately (albeit inadvertently) slaying his opponent outright.

The killing of any sentient being (even in self-defense) being irrevocably against the Legion's charter, Star Boy is summarily placed on trial by his grim and ashen-faced fellows. The charge: murder.

The teen assembly finds its membership polarized into two separate (and irreconcilable) camps, as a result of this nightmarish incident. One faction -- represented during the trial by the implacable ubergenius, Brainiac V -- stood resolute in its conviction that there could never ever be any reason or rationale for any Legionnaire knowingly taking the life of any sentient.

The other encampment -- as personified by the equally resolute Superboy -- felt that (as stated by The Boy of SSteel, at the top of this page) "... the Legion code should be amended to permit Legionnaires to take life for the purpose of saving life! Mon-El and I are invulnerable... but you others aren't, and should have the right of self-defense!"

This was -- by any approximation -- heady fare, indeed, for "children's literature"... be it of the Silver Age, or the current one.

However, it was by no means all Sturm und Drang for our 30th Century Teens, during this (still-)definitive period in their checkered storytelling history. As evidence, I offer up COOL MOMENT THE VII: "Head Trauma Will Do That To a Man, You Know..." (i.e., "The Legion's Suicide Squad"; ADVENTURE COMICS #319)

Check it out: seven Legionnaires need to be selected for what will most assuredly be a "suicide mission," versus an impregnable alien fortress. How, do you suppose, were said seven team members ultimately selected...?

If you answered with: "... by bopping them on their respective noggins until they were too dazed and confused to say "no freakin' way!' "... then give yourself an extra five Legionnaire brownie points. You hopelessly obsessed maniac, you. [See pictures, below]

Oh, yeah... I know I'd be, y'know, champing at the bit to follow a team leader into straits perilous whose primary qualifications were: "I'm nursing a baby concussion, right about now."

(It's oddly comforting, in retrospect, to have actual, canonical evidence that the electoral process, ten centuries from now, is even sillier than our present-day assortment of methodologies. I'm just sayin', is all.)

Backpedaling frantically towards the High Drama section of our little exhibition, however... we come to yet another instance of precisely how disturbingly high was the group mortality rate for our little adolescent armada: the horrifyingly sudden (and just plain horrifying, really) death of one of the Legion's longest-tenured members, in the storytelling process of COOL MOMENT Octavius: "I Got Your 'Three Laws of Robotics' Right Here, Wussyboys -- !!" (a.k.a., "Computo the Conqueror"; ADVENTURE COMICS #340). [See cover reproduction, below]

Resident team smartybritches Brainiac V -- while attempting to construct and program "the ultimate computer" -- manages to breathe inadvertent "life," instead, to the Frankenstein's Monster-ish Computo: as malevolent a melange o' memory boards and cranky circuitry as ever shambled its silicon chips across the pages of a comic book.

This epic two-part tale, however, contained yet another "cool moment," as well: specifically...

... COOL MOMENT NUMBER NINE... NUMBER NINE... NUMBER NINE: "My Folks Went To the Bat-Cave, and All I Got Was This Crummy T-Shirt." (a.k.a., "The Weirdo Legionnaire"; ADVENTURE COMICS #341)

(I love the "bit," by the way, where a placid "so we lost another member, just a few moments ago. Willya just take a look at all the waycool goodies in this place, f'cryinoutloud...?!?" Sun Boy takes the time to give Superboy a guided tour of said cavern's mouldering, dust-covered trophies. Geez, fellah; why not take him to see the 30th Century Broadway revival of CATS, too, while you're at it...?)

Even given the sort of communal "body count" one normally associates more readily with land-based wars in Southeast Asian climes, however... there was certainly never any scarcity of super-powered teens ready, willing and eager to step right up and take their respective places at the Legion "table."

Don't believe me...?

Go ahead, then; check out Page Three of this incredibly sloppy and sarcastic LEGION memorial.

I'll meet you right there; just wanna stop by the souvenir shop for one of those tres niftique "Bat-Cave" t-shirts.

Legion of Super-Heroes (History): PAGE ONE

Legion of Super-Heroes (History): PAGE THREE

Legion of Super-Heroes (History): PAGE FOUR

Legion of Super-Heroes (History): PAGE FIVE

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