Sunday, January 14, 2007

The Starman conundrum

My head hurts from trying to reconcile the various Star Boys and Starmen. Let's see, does this make sense (comic book sense, at least) to anyone?

  • The original Star Boy was last seen with the rest of the Legion prior to the Glorithverse reboot (following the Mordruverse issue of v4). He had a nifty and influential costume. His Glorithverse counterpart faded away with Zero Hour.


  • The post-Zero Hour version was a different person with a new costume and a new history. This one day, at Legion camp, he met a time-travelling Jack Knight (aka Starman VII) from the 20th century, and he found out his destiny included going back in time to the 21st century where he would take the name Danny Blaine and be known as Starman VIII.



  • In Kingdom Come, an Elseworlds tale, we met a guy with a costume visually based on the pre-ZH Star Boy's. He's known as Starman VIII, and in the official annotations to the book it is said that he is Thom Kallor from the 30th century (but which one?).

  • In Starman #80, a time-travelling Starman meets Jack Knight again, but he's a Thom Kallor (which one?) from the end of his career rather than the beginning. He's wearing the Kingdom Come suit, though with yellow gloves instead of white. It is to be assumed that this is the post-Zero Hour version, since that's the one Jack met in the future and that's the one who was being published at the time. But Thom tells Jack that the future is not set: while Jack's present was the past of Thom's 31st century, Jack's future might not be Thom's present.


  • Meanwhile, back in the 31st century, there's another Star Boy who is black.


  • In JSA #2, yet another Starman appears. This one also wears the Kingdom Come Starman's costume, but there's a good reason for that - at the end of the issue, he reveals that not only is he a white man (and thus not the current post-Infinite Crisis version), but that he was trapped in the Kingdom Come timeline and he makes references to having been the pre-Zero Hour Star Boy.



Whew!

OK, now over on Wizard Universe, here's what JSA writer Geoff Johns has to say about this:
WIZARD: So with that last page, is it safe to say that this is indeed the Starman from Kingdom Come?

JOHNS: Yes. There’s still a lot more to him, and the next arc coming up is essentially all about Starman.

(There's a LOT more about Starman, the Legion, and the JSA in that interview. Check it out!)

For those who want to read about the Kenz Nuhor incident and what that "10 to 9 vote" means, check out this comprehensive article.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

As I recall, Thom did show up post-Mordruverse, pre-Zero Hour as the coach of a Naltorian (I think?) baseball team. Was that the last time we saw him, or did he show up during the whole "everybody merge!" bit just before the reboot? If not, it's possible that he was thrown out of time at that point.

Of course, this doesn't explain Dawnstar....though, as always, I'm hoping for a "classic" Legion back....

Ragnell said...

As I recall, Thom did show up post-Mordruverse, pre-Zero Hour as the coach of a Naltorian (I think?) baseball team.

I have that issue. He got sexually harassed by the team owner. Nura was there too, as the chunkified High Seer.