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The Return of the Legion of Superheroes Is the Best DC News in Years

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Ever since DC All-In #1 shocked readers in 2024, fans have been getting teases of the return of the group, starting with the Darkseid Legion, an evil version of the classic team. While the group is one of those key DC concepts, they have been entirely too hard of a sell in recent years. However, something feels different this time; there’s an excitement about their return that there hasn’t been in decades. DC has announced the return of the team for 2026, and it may be the final piece of the puzzle for the company.

DC May Have Finally Found the Key to Making the Legion Work Again

Image COurtesy of DC Comics

One of the keys to DC’s current success is that they’ve been able to rebuild so much of what fans loved about the publisher. There was a time in the not so distant past that the only thing they had going for them was Batman and Batman-related comics. However, they started rebuilding the Superman books, slowly but surely, while also bringing back Wally West as the Flash and the various Golden Age heroes, and putting A-list talent on teams like the Titans and solo heroes like Wonder Woman. The Absolute books have been the icing on the cake.

The Legion has been the missing ingredient in the DC formula for a long time now. Crisis on Infinite Earths birthed modern DC, but it also killed the Legion by removing Superboy and Supergirl from the publisher’s history. Since that change in 1986, we’ve had no less than five reboots of the team. Some of them have been successful, like the ’90s reboot and the ’00s Threeboot. However, since the attempted return of the Silver Age team in the late ’00s, the company has never been able to build the team for longterm success.

Since 2005, DC has been trying to recapture the breadth of the old Silver and Bronze Ages and the Legion has always been the problem. It’s an old school superhero team, a massive group with a history that can seem very opaque to an outsider. As they’ve lost relevance, it’s been hard them to sell to new fans. Fans in the 21st century seem to love the idea of the Legion in DC history more than they do in actually reading the team’s adventures. It’s been so long since there have been amazing Legion stories, that most modern fans don’t really have any kind of relationship with them.

The return of the Legion as villains in the build-up to DC K.O. was an inspired idea and it helped remind readers of the basics of the group. It was just the right way to bring them back to the fore and there is a lot of hype for them suddenly. DC has been succeeding with the returns of the Justice League and the Justice Society, and fans are more open to their attempts with the Legion because of the successes the publisher has been having elsewhere. Readers are ready for the Legion to return, and their return could give readers something they haven’t had in decades: the past, present, and future of superheroes all alive and popular at the same time.

The Legion of Superheroes Is the Last Piece DC Needs to Be What They Were

The Silver Age Legion Of Superheroes
Image Courtesy of DC Comics

The Legion of Superheroes were always an important part of the DC Multiverse in the Silver and Bronze Ages. They were an integral part of the Superman mythos, and had developed their own massive history over the decades. They were the ultimate convoluted DC superhero saga, and as every in DC changed, the team lost its momentum. As the company has rebuilt itself over the decades, the Legion is always the missing piece.

DC is hitting in a way they haven’t in ages, and they’ve done a fantastic job in the last few years. The Legion is the last piece of the puzzle, and if DC can succeed with them like they’ve been succeeding with everything else lately, it’ll be a huge deal. Fans have been praising the publisher for the last few years, and if they can finally make the Legion into what it once was, it’ll prove we’re entering a new golden age of DC Comics.

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