LNH20: LNH20 Comics Presents #21 [2/2]

[Scott Eiler]

On 2018-01-18 21:28, Jeanne Morningstar wrote:

> There was a massive, towering room full of books. More books than you 
> can imagine. And if you're imagining more, there's even more than that.
> 
> "Welcome to the Infinite Library," said the woman in a white suit, who 
> Asma instantly recognized as January Frost. "Emergency headquarters of 
> the Legion of Net.Heroes."
> 
> "It gives us the power to enter any library in the world, and in theory, 
> the entire multiverse," said a young Egyptian man in a natty suit who 
> was, of course, Library Lad.

That's a suitable base of operations for anyone.  Until...!


> "Like, who's that" said Asma.
> 
> "Who do you think?" said Doc Nostalgia, stepping from behind a bookshelf 
> full of romance novels.
> 
> "Huh?" said Asma.
> 
> "He may be a bit of a crank," said Fearless Leader, "but he's a 
> firebrand socialist at heart."
> 
> "And I still believe in the Legion," he said. "It's my curse to only 
> value things after they are gone. I'll admit the Legion was frustrating 
> sometimes... Well, all the time. But now I can see how important it was."

That's a good explanation for him.


> "Hey, it's not done for yet." Fearless Leader tapped him on the nose.
> 
> "No, you're right. It isn't." Doc Nostalgia embraced him and kissed him 
> on the lips.
> 
> *****
> 
> THE LEGION OF NET.HEROES
> Is only going to get gayer from here
> 
> *****

I may have said this before, but there's plenty of gayness embedded in 
nostalgia.

> Sigrid's eyes rested on a poster of Ultimate Mercenary, wearing the 
> costume he had in the ninja wars. "I never thought I was going to say 
> this, but I miss that guy," she said. "Do you ever miss the old days? 
> When we were just starting out? When it seemed like everything could 
> turn out alright, and we just might change the world?"
> 
> "They don't seem terribly long ago for me. I'm an immortal, remember? I 
> grew up in Whitechapel at the turn of the 19th century. The place where 
> all the cruelty and oppression of the world's greatest empire came to 
> rest in its very heart. On days like this, I feel I've scarcely left it 
> behind. But these times are when I'm the most needed. Once, I fought to 
> escape my roots, to distance myself from poverty and misery. Now I fight 
> to keep anyone from suffering what I suffered.
> 
> "The Legion are everything I believe in. They're not the world's police 
> or gods on earth. They're a community. A community that will take 
> anyone, whatever their race or gender or ability, if they have courage 
> in their hearts. A community with a place for even the most seemingly 
> useless. A community that exists to look out for those who have no one 
> else to look out for them. And for that, we were hated. Oh yes. We were 
> hated long before this year. The backlash was always going to come. I 
> knew. I've seen it before. But it doesn't have to be the end. We're 
> still here. There are still those who admire us and look to us for hope, 
> and we owe it to them to keep fighting. We can still change the world."
> 
> "God," said Sigrid, "I hope so."

I don't recall reading that about January Frost before now.  But it's a 
good explanation.
> 
> *****
> 
> You have been reading
> LNH20 COMICS PRESENTS #21
> instead of paying five dollars for an event comic. This was a good choice.

Well, okay.



> Notes:
> 
> I wrote this last year, not long after the election. When election 
> results came in, I was reading Dark Reign. I've been in the middle of 
> reading through all of Bendis's Avengers run on Marvel Unlimited, and I 
> was struck by how weird it was in the early Obama era and how this setup 
> fit where we are now better than it did then.

Dark Reign had to do some gymnastics to fit into the Obama presidency. 
As I recall, Doc Samson got slandered and irradiated.


> I was also thinking about 
> LNH20, and how that had been inspired by both the Obama-age zeitgeist 
> and the early New 52, and how many things had changed in both the world 
> and comics since then. So here we are.

I'd do apocalypse stories for my favorite universe, only I've been doing 
them for years now.  Pesky universe that's written itself into a corner 
*and* elected President Trump four years early.


> I had envisioned LNH20 as something that would move vaguely closer to 
> real time, at least at first--as the world became more superhero-y and 
> LNH-y, it would start to flatten out into comic book time, and people 
> would remark on that. It turned out we weren't really able to write 
> enough LNH20 stories for this to work, but the fact it had been five 
> years (!) since then gave me room for a nice dramatic time skip. We're 
> not totally done with the original status quo of course--there's plenty 
> of room for more stories to be told, both from the team's early history 
> and the period from Spoon of Destiny to now. (And now of course this 
> issue is a year behind on the timeline but ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.)
> 
> I wound up sitting on this issue for a year because I was hoping to get 
> Spoon of Destiny done first, and I'd left too many storylines unfinished 
> and skipped too many steps. But I've decided it's more important to be 
> just writing regularly and get the stuff out there, and hopefully 
> that'll give us motivation to keep pushing on. Also this felt 
> appropriate for the first post under my new name.
> 
> Besides Dark Reign (Doc Nostalgia's current appearance is based on the 
> Sentry), this setup is also drawing on the Outback era of X-Men (with 
> Library Lad, who has the power to navigate the Infinite Library, as 
> Gateway) and the 90s animated series. A lot of the mood, tone and motifs 
> came from Nextwave! And of course there's also the dystopian Five Years 
> Later version of LSH (the version that was current when Classic LNH was 
> founded, and which it partially came about in reaction to). The 
> post-credits scene bit is inspired by a plot element from that series, 
> as well as the current All-New X-Men.
> 
> I have no idea where any of these plot threads are going so feel free to 
> do whatever.
> 
> Oh yes, there's a post-credits scene:
> 
> ****
> 
> Kid Enthusiastic walked past the pile of stunned guards into the secret 
> lab. (Which had a large sign above it saying "SECRET LAB--KEEP OUT--NO 
> GIRLS.") He whistled the Mission Impossible theme to himself.
> 
> "Kid Enthusiastic's Super Rad War Journal, day 73. Still haven't been 
> able to make contact with the rest of the team. I made it into the base. 
> Now I'm gonna find out what WHATEVER's big secret is..."

Yeah, sounds like his war journal.


> A group of transparent cylinders were clustered around a device. Inside 
> of them were teenagers, wearing bright and outdated costumes.
> 
> "...What the heck?"
> 
> They were clearly the Saviors of the Net.

(insert "da da dunnn" noise)


-- 
(signed) Scott Eiler  8{D> -------- http://www.eilertech.com/ ---------

When you *are* the leader... whatever goes wrong... whether you did it
or not... *you* are held responsible. - Barack Obama

I know. - Archie Andrews

- from Archie #617, March 2011, scripted by Alex Simmons.