The Legion Companion [Paperback]

Glen Cadigan (Author), Dave Cockrum (Illustrator), Mike Grell (Illustrator), Curt Swan (Illustrator), Jim Shooter (Introduction)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 24, 2003

In time for the Legion of Super Heroes' 45th anniversary, The Legion Companion takes a behind-the-scenes look at the story behind the comic book, in the acclaimed format of TwoMorrows' other "Companion" volumes. Set in the 30th Century, the Legion was originally conceived as a spin-off of Superman, featuring his adventures with the team while he was still Superboy.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

It may not be exactly what you'd expect from the title, but Legion Companion offers plenty of information for fans of the 30th century's greatest super group. It's a collection of dozens of interviews with virtually every creative talent that worked on the Legion of Super-Heroes, including Jim Shooter, Curt Swan, Paul Levitz, Jim Starlin, Jimmy Janes, Keith Giffen, and Steve Lightle. Some of the interviews (and Shooter's "How I Spent My Summer Vacation" intro) appeared in the 1980s-vintage fanzine The Legion Outpost, but most were conducted in 2003, and the book is generously illustrated in black and white with both original comic panels and rare items from the subjects' personal collections. Legion Companion, however, is not a convenient reference guide to Legion lore, so you're out of luck if you're looking for a quick explanation of the story of Ferro Lad or the significance of the Legion Reboot. That's not to say that whatever info you want isn't here--it might be, but you'll have to make an informed guess or scan through a lot of interviews to find it. Still, one can't discount the value of having this much information straight from the mouths of so many writers and artists collected in one convenient volume, and if you're an LSH fan, you'll probably find it surprisingly absorbing. --David Horiuchi

Product Details

• Paperback: 224 pages
• Publisher: TwoMorrows Publishing; Graphic novel edition (November 24, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1893905225
• ISBN-13: 978-1893905221
• Product Dimensions: 10.5 x 9 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,382,459 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Memories of Futures Passed, January 19, 2004

By 

James F. Mills (Los Angeles, CA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Legion Companion (Paperback)

Despite the deceptive title, this was an interesting and informative book, stirring up many memories of the Legion. Basically, the book is the transcript of interviews with virtually every writer or artist who ever wrote/drew for the series. In instances where the writer or artist is dead, articles from other sources are reprinted.

Some of the interviews are quite thorough, especially the 2 Jim Shooter interviews, the 2 Paul Levitz interviews (Shooter and Levitz are considered the greatest Legions writers) and the Dave Cockrum one (Cockrum's the artist who redesigned the costumes in the early 70s before bolting to Marvel to relaunch X-Men). Readers will learn a lot about the business of making comics and the personalities involved. For that alone, its a worthwhile purchase.

Also enjoyable is the artwork accompanying the interviews -- sometimes reprinted pages from the series, other times drawings from the artists' personal collection or fan drawings. Like they say, a picture is worth a thousand words. In this case, it's more like a picture is worth a thousand memories.

On the downside, many of the other interviews, espcailly those with obscure artists or writers who only drew or wrote an issue or two, seem pointless. Also frustrating is the lack of "footnotes" to explain obscure or insider references mentioned in the interviews. On several occasions, I was left scratching my head, unable to figure out what they were talking about (and I know comics well!).

What would have made this book more user-friendly is a listing of each issue that the artist/writer drew/wrote at the beginning of the interview, along with the significant events that happened in those issues to refresh memories. Also missing is an opening article giving a detailed overview of the series in an easily digestable form.

Nonetheless, I loved reading about this inside scoop and reliving the memories of my all-time favorite comic series. In fact, after reading it, I took the plunge and bought a couple of those harback Legion Archive books reprinting the early stories in chronilogical order that I've been lusting after for years.

10 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Great Interview Books, November 9, 2003

By 

M. B. RENTZLER (Brooklyn, NY USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Legion Companion (Paperback)

Though listed as the Legion Companion book I think it should have been more aptly named the "Legion Interview" book.

This book interviews everyone and I do mean everyone which in one way can be one of it's few weaknesses. I might have wanted more indepth interviews of the key Legion players even at the exclusion of some of the minor ones.

The other thing I wished for were some non-interview articles about the Legion-time line-missed story opertunities etc. Well maybe in another book.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Only for Legion fanatics!, January 9, 2007

By 

Patrick D. Preston "LobVolley" (Lexington, KY) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Legion Companion (Paperback)

This book is a collection of interviews with just about every Legion of Super-Heroes artist and writer from their beginnings in 1958 through the nineties. Some of the interviews are more interesting than others, but they all give insight into the process of writing and illustrating a comic series. Sadly, I did not feel that there was enough interesting new material relating solely to the LSH. I would consider it much weaker than The Legion Outpost as a source for interesting material on the LSH.