Legion of Super-Heroes, Vol. 8: Enemy Manifest

Legion of Super-Heroes (2005)

by Jim Shooter, Francis Manapul (Illustrator)

Legendary LEGION OF SUPER-HEROES writer Jim Shooter continues his return to the 31st century with ENEMY MANIFEST, the latest volume starring the greatest heroes of the future. While war looms and a traitor plots against the Legion from within, a massive, hostile planet appears near Jupiter, and its gravity
is ripping apart the solar system! It's tense drama and high action as a recruitment drive takes place and the beginning of the Universal
Annihilation War reveals itself!

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels, Science Fiction, Dc Comics, Superheroes, Comic Book, Graphic Novels Comics

144 pages, Hardcover

First published May 12, 2009

About the author

James Charles Shooter was an American writer, editor and publisher in the comics industry. Beginning his career writing for DC Comics at the age of 14, he had a successful but controversial run as editor-in-chief at Marvel Comics, and launched comics publishers Valiant, Defiant, and Broadway.

Reviews

[Kyle]

Poorly paced and seemingly unfinished. This collection is a prime example of how not to conclude a comics series.

Still, I enjoyed the artwork and some of the writing. I just wish they would have had a better game plan when they decided to end LSH. So many loose ends, so many unanswered questions. The final page is simply laughable.

2.5/5

[Dan]

Ultra Boy: Garth? There's something I have to tell you...

Lightning Lad: I already know.

Ultra Boy: Look, I...caught her at a weak moment, and...you know me, I'm a dog...and, yeah, I made a move...But then she hit the off switch. I tried, I won't deny that, but, anyway...nothing happened.

Lightning Lad: That's not what she said.

Ultra Boy: What?! Why would she...lie? Garth, you gotta believe me! I...don't know what's up with that...But you were right last night. I'm a jerk! If you want to take a swing at me...free shot, no invulnerability, honest.

Lightning Lad: Ten minutes ago I would have done a lot more than that.

Ultra Boy: Look, if you want me to leave...

Lightning Lad: No. Brainy tells me we're in for a rough ride. This is no time for in-fighting. We need all hands. I'm the leader. That comes before my personal feelings. You'd better get some rest. No telling when you'll get another chance. And one more thing...Stay the florg away from me.

Disappointed with the previous volume of this Jim Shooter run, I still persevered to see where the story would end. And, incredibly, the series decreased in quality even further. It's poorly written; it's poorly plotted, and overly sexualized. In fact, Shooter includes an homage to Janet Jackson's nipple-gate when a heroine's breast pops out her uniform while scuffling during a Legion try-out session. Why? I believe it's for laughs and titillation (if you'll allow the pun). Does it add anything to the story, provide insight into character? Nope. Just more frosting to disguise the turd beneath.

Disappointing. So much potential just wasted.

Brainiac 5: We have now confirmed the arrival of over a hundred such planets, each bearing billions of alien destroyers, destabilizing every major system in the U.P.

Lightning Lad: This is it, Folks! It's gonna take everyone who ever wore a flight ring to save the whole sproggin' universe, but most of all it's gonna take us.

Ultra Boy: You know I love a challenge, Lightning Lad, but how are seven of us supposed to fight a hundred planets?!

[Michael]

They canceled this for GJ's "unboot"?! Now I'm really angry. Shooter's Legion is surprisingly strong. The guy kept so many balls in the air - Lightning Lad's leadership dilemmas, M'Rrissy, Projectra, the politics, the villains, KK and Trip's disappearances, Saturn Girl & Ultra Boy (what a great pairing!), Brainiac 5 and Invisible Kid's comraderie, IK's attempts to impress Gazelle, new members - and it all works. It's smart, fun, and best of all, surprising. Shooter's Legion is just a great run. Good artwork (I didn't even mind Rick Leonardi's scratchy fill-in) throughout. And it kills me - absolutely slays me - that instead of resolutions to the massively compelling Princess Projectra betrayal storyline (or an answer to what happened to Karate Kid and Triplicate Girl), we get GJ writing back-ups about (supposedly) Paul's versions of these characters (incarnations which had perfectly fine send-offs twenty years ago) in Adventure Comics. Feh. Thanks for the good times, Jim Shooter. This will probably be the last new Legion story I read for a long, long time.

[Alan]

Jim Shooter returns tot he series where he sold his first story to at 16 over 4 decades ago. His writing has improved over the years, but not the temper that has led to his so many forced resignations/firings. I mention that because that is what happened here, and the most interesting plot thread is not resolved. While th concept of a traitor within the Legion is not new the depths and scope of the traitor's quest for revenge were handled better than ever before. Sadly this is the hanging plot thread.

The good is that each character has their own voice. Shooter throws some big science fiction concepts out there, and while the science might not be good or practical (using the quantum field as a server farm for a network) it is the old fashioned BIG SCIENCE concept. Sprinkled with current ideas about avatars and VR living.

It would have been nice if Shooter could have finished the story he started, but the two volumes he did complete are a very satisfactory read.

[James]

Some good moments, especially the ultimate reveal behind the villains' motivations. But the story is rushed to a conclusion as an unstoppable foe crumbles pretty easily. Brainy's "date" with Dream Girl has some sweet elements but is pretty creepy in the final reckoning, given the medium's role and the violent aftermath. Read in original issues.

[Karl Kindt]

Terrific story by the best Legion of Super Heroes writer. Shooter truly uses the characters in LSH as more than cardboard cutouts with powers. He sees how powers beyond the normal would affect a human psyche.

[Mike Jozic]

I didn't expect much from Shooter's return to the book after so many years but I genuinely enjoyed his brief run (the book was cancelled shortly after his return) and was sorry to see it off the shelves.

[Mike McDevitt]

Storyline finished up as well as it could: I wish Jim Shooter could have pulled the trigger on Projectra's looming betrayal. Long Live the Legion!

[Will Cooper]

The characters are taken in directions that are either uninteresting or seem against their character.

Also, these recent LSH comics have introduced the annoying thing of having made up curse words even though the rest of the language is regular English and then for the sake of a joke, a character says "I won't be Sizzle Lass. Think about it." The joke here is her name would sound like Sizzle Ass, but this world doesn't even have that word, so that doesn't even make sense. It's somewhat infuriating? Anyway, Shooter's storyline is done and we will see what Paul Levitz has in mind next.

[Richard Dominguez]

I know that one of my pet peeves about stories is way too much action ad not enough dialog. A story without strong meaningful dialog is never a good story.
Then we have "Enemy Manifest" that goes in the complete other direction. A story with pages and pages of dialog with no meaning diversion from the dialog, it simply got too difficult to hold my attention. Mind you I did finish reading it but it is not one I will re-read any time soon.
The artwork was nice, neat and sharp, everything benefiting from the coloring, but there was nothing exceptional to any of it.

[Hisham]

The concluding storyline to Jim Shooter's return run on Legion of Super-Heroes. It offers a compelling science fiction concept of virtual reality beings out to destroy real life, but the overall story fails to create much excitement. The artwork and storytelling is decent, but not exceptional. The characters are clearly defined, but not very likeable or interesting. Plus, there's a significant subplot that looks like it never got resolved.

Really only something for Legion completionists.

[Steven]

So very disappointing that Shooter returning to LSH just meant some of the worst stories in decades

Originally marked as two stars but realized that was nostalgia & love for the characters I’ve held since 1976 when I first read them; it’s honestly a 0.75 star for what’s on the page and in the poor story and worse characterizations

[Sean]

After the fun last volume this was a definite letdown. The book felt so dated and was so overally verbose that pages were a struggle to get through. Author Jim Shooter starts to add some drama to the team and then either walks it back or makes it insane. The art was fine for the time. Overall, this was incredibly boring and showed some of the worst parts of Legion comics, tedium.

[Elizabeth]

Enjoyed the story and artwork.

[George]

Much grittier than the legion I remember…but I really enjoyed this trip down memory lane

[Billy H]

last issue was a rush (due to series being cancelled) and left so much outstanding.

[Emile Rudoy]

Aunque le puse cuatro estrellas quizás ahora que hice una relectura diría que es de tres y media. La historia iba bastante bien pero si el último número se siente un poco anticlimático y obvio que la historia de Projectra necesitaba mas números para terminar de desarrollarse. Me sucedió algo muy curioso con ella. Obviamente terminaría siendo la villana (tiempo después Jim Shooter lo confirmaría en su página de internet) sin embargo entiendo sus razones. En fin, a diferencia de otras cosas que quizás podrán corregirse en otras entregas de la Legion (si es que existen) esta jamás lo hará ya que prácticamente están olvidados (según yo, su última aparición se da en Final Crisis - Legion of Three Worlds que espero releer en estos días). Ahora, otro punto para bajarle media estrella (si es que aquí se pudiera) es que son solo seis números y Francis Manapul solo está en tres y quien lo sustituyo no estaba al nivel). En fin, un run de la Legion que tuvo momentos interesantes que debido a decisiones editoriales se vio truncada. Si, en su momento me agradó el regreso de la Legion original (obvio con sus reservas, ya que típico de Geoff Johns solo toma lo que le gusta del pasado y acomoda a su antojo las cosas), pero también me hubiera gustado ver mas de esta encarnación.

[Ryan Haupt]

The Legion can be hit or miss, I've yet to go read the back catalog of old issues but I knew people who rave about them. This arc has some early Francis Manapul art, which was the initial draw. You can see how he got to his current style, but this ain't it, not that it's bad, just more normal. The story is interesting enough, always good to give Brainiac-5 a foil against his science (however sympathetic to science I may be). Not too shabby but definitely not the first Legion book I'd hand to a newcomer.

[Shannon Appelcline]

Like the first volume, this one has decent plotting but crappy scripting full of silliness and unlikely situations compounded by people acting in pretty unlikely ways. Then there's the ending which is a deus ex machina that doesn't even really make sense. I'm certain Shooter didn't used to suck this much. (And having now reread his earliest works in Archives, I can say it definitively ... but then he didn't try to tell larger stories like this in his youth.)

[Damián Vives]

Shooter continúa con su desatino. Una lástima que los editores permitieran que un periodo tan bello como el de Waid terminara de manera cuasi miserable. Intuyo que trataron pobremente de cautivar a un perfil de lector que no es el de esta serie.

[John Yelverton]

The end of yet another "Legion" book series, and as always, it ends on a whimper.

[Esther]

Interesting concept behind the rising enemy threat. I especially enjoyed the tension between Garth & Imra.

[Oliver]

Too abrupt ending to a storyline with much potential... sad.