peter john rios

LSH season 2 ep.1: “The Man from the Edge of Towmorrow, part 2”

Decided to start watching season two of the Legion of Super-Heroes cartoon, mostly in an effort to absorb more DC Animated Universe shows (and yes, I include LSH in that) so I can finally start watching Young Justice. I know it doesn’t necessarily always connect show to show, but I’m all about history and the shows build on each other at least in terms of design, execution, production continuity, etc. So I need to power through this season so I can move on to the Batman and then Brave and the Bold and then finally YJ. Somewhere down the road I want to go back to the Batman Animated series from the beginning all the way through to the Superman Animated series and ending with Batman Beyond. But that’s for the future.

For now, I’m back with Legion and we return to the 31st Century after some time has passed since the end of Season 1. This is evident by Brainiac 5 looking taller, Lightning Lad sporting a beard, more characters on the team (Chameleon Boy in this episode), etc. I knew a “new” Superman appeared in this season, but I thought it was a character from the 31st Century. I didn’t expect him to be from the future of the future - namely the 41st Century. It’s a set up introducing the new Superman (and his “parents” named K.3.N.T - or the Kents. Clever.), a new villain threat (Imperiex - a crossover from the Jeph Loeb Superman books years earlier) and a subtle nod to the Legion’s status quo (preparing for a possible attack by the Dominators). The story is fairly straight forward, giving Superman X his space, but there are some other interesting bits as well: the warp key that enables time travel is said to harness “long lost technology” (Boom Tube?), Anti-Matter Waves destroying Superman X’s time (very Crisis), and, in this part, the seeming death of one of Triplicate Girl’s bodies when she’s grabbed by a mechanical arm and pulled into the destructive waves (somewhat resembling the way she dies in the comics at the “arms” of Computo). So far it’s an interesting set up and I look forward to part 2 and the rest of the season!