Toshi's Comix Bargain Basement

Comics from my personal collection, sold at really low prices!

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Sunday, November 30, 2003

Yay! I love getting my paycheck! Nice to see all that hard work pay off in the form of sweet cold cash. First things first, set aside the family contribution... wouldn't do good to spend that. And the rest is mine! Yahoo!!!

Welcome to the 30th Century

I finally got a lot of the Legion of Super-Heroes: Five Years After issues from Kintaro! I haven't read 'em yet, just scanned through 'em, but I can't wait to dive into my new stack!

A little backgrounder on the Legion, which began publication in the late 50's/early 60's...

It was the future.

Enter a public spacecraft bearing passengers going about their daily routine of commuting from planet to planet. Three teens happened to be at the right place at the right time. Rokk from Braal, with the native power of magnetism. Imra from Titan, could read minds better than anyone else on a planetful of telepaths. Garth from Winath, got struck by a lightning beast thereby gaining the same powers.

Enter R.J. Brande, one of the richest men in the galaxy. Another passenger in a journey that would lead further than expected. Potential target for men who want to get rich quick.

Enter three would-be-assailants, bent on attacking R.J. Brande.

Three strangers who don't know each other come together to stop them. Imra, alarmed by the thoughts of the three crooks, pre-empts the attack. Rokk and Garth pool their powers to stop them. Brande, a witness and participant to all these, decides that the age of heroes is indeed deserving of a comeback.

Enter the Legion of Super-Heroes.

Cosmic Boy (Rokk) leads his team of three. Lightning Lad (Garth) and Saturn Girl (Imra) stay by their leader's side. Brande finances the organization.

Soon after, word of these three crimefighters' exploits reach other planets. Other teens begin realizing their own potential to do good.

First to join is Luornu. Three women who look exactly the same meet up with each of the Legionnaires, explaining to them why they deserve membership in the Legion. They have a power that they can't reveal as of that moment. As soon as the three women lead the other Legionnaires into one common room, they merge to become one single woman. Triplicate Girl gains instant membership. Days after, a ghost invades their headquarters. The invader turns out to be another aspiring member, Tinya, with the power of intangibility. Phantom Girl becomes their second new member.

Other teens try out for what started as a club, but not everyone makes it. Perhaps the biggest accomplishment of the Legion when it came to their membership, was the induction of Smallville resident Superboy! The three founders travel to the past and invite Clark to apply. As a member, Clark would race to the future each time the team needed him. The same would hold true for another member of the Legion, Kara, better known as Supergirl!

Tales of the 60's would revolve around idealistic stories, perhaps echoing a simpler time where heroes and villains were as distinguishable as black and white. The 70's ushered in interplantery wars, long-time couples getting married, betrayal from within and even deaths that would prove to be irreversible. 80's plots were more complicated, featuring a former Legion member murdering another, and the dramatic execution of that traitor, ramifications brought about by Kara's death alongside a crisis that would threaten to end all that lives, and a mystery that would almost drive a member to the brink of insanity.

Enter the 90's. The future is grim, desolate and hopeless. The Legion is no more. Welcome to Five Years After.

What makes the Legion so interesting is that they start out as bright and happy teens in the 60's, and end up as mixed-up pessimistic adults in the 90's (well... with the exception of Tenzil that is, who this blogsite is named after). You really can't blame them, with everything that they went through, which the reader is privy to every step of the way. The readers see their heroes grow up, as they themselves grow old in the real world. I remember a story about a guy reading the Legion in the 90's, found out that his dad read the Legion back in the 60's!

Here's a good resource site if you want to learn more:

http://members.shaw.ca/legion_of_super-heroes/mainpage.htm (Legion circa 60's)

Something That's Been Bothering Me

You know the song "1968. Tell me what to say. Baby, please don't leave me..." I'm not sure 'bout the lyrics, but I have to know. Is it really "1968?" Because it sounds more like "nineteen six to eight." The things we think about sometimes...

Coming of Age

That's the title of this week's episode of Degrassi. It's because Emma gets her period. I used to think when I was a kid that the blood comes out of women's butts. Then again, I also thought that their urine came from the butt as well which is why they had to sit down to pee. I'm glad my female friends set me straight. Ashley and Jimmy break up because she feels suffocated by him. A brief peek into Jimmy's home life explains a lot of things. This line really struck me, and I mean struck me hard:

"You don't bring people into your life just to throw them away."

Brrrrrrr.

Jon the Jerk

Very emotional episode of Survivor. Having their loved ones visit and be part of the reward challenge was prolly the proverbial straw for a lot of them. That Jon is one big a-how. What an @$$! Anything to win, eh? Can't wait 'till the others find out (and they will).

Beaten Up

A friend of ours got beaten up by a drunk acquaintance in a club a few days ago. Along with James, Al and Alden, we visited Lenin in the hospital yesterday. I hope that his surgery went well. It was hard seeing his mom trying not to let her tears fall. We'd catch her wipe her eyes a couple of times. Lenin seemed to be taking things well. I hope our visit helped uplift him a bit. I wish we could do more.

And In Other Related News...

I also got the 3rd installment of JLA/Avengers. Time gets messed up. Both teams' histories mesh and intertwine. Penultimate chapter of Planet X. Magneto kills Basilisk. Angel and Beak realize their mistake. Esme learns the real score between her and Magneto. Everything is falling apart. Penultimate chapter of Draco. More on Nightcrawler's true origin and Polaris' crumbling mind. Penultimate chapter of Back from the Dead. The Orphan kills Spike! Spike's black market secret. Lacuna is shot by the sniper (nnnnnoooooooooooooooooo!!!!!!!!!). Henrietta is losing her hold on the public. The higher they rise, the harder they fall. Halfway through Wildguard's first storyarc. Last installment of JLA-Z. A real stinker, just like the first 2 parts. Emma Frost: Higher Learning Part 5. Her brother, Christian, hangs himself (echoes of Nyx #2's suicide in the bathtub). Trouble (Last Chapter). Mary's sacrifice. Everything comes full circle as Spider-Man's real mom ("Aunt" May) ends up raising him in the Ultimate Universe. Cosmic Karma :)

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