LSH v4 #8 Annotations: "Five Years Later" (part 8)

Annotations for Legion of Super-Heroes v4 #8

• On sale date: April 10, 1990 
• It's OK, I'm a Senator: Issue 8 Recollections (March 28, 2009). This is Tom Bierbaum discussing all of the stuff going on behind the scenes that culminated in this issue.
• Legion of Substitute Podcasters episode 561 (July 15, 2019)
• Timeline: This issue takes place on December 1-2, 2994

• According to this week's IOKIAS, Keith had fallen behind and a fill-in story was needed, so they decided to re-tell the Legion’s new origin story in light of the post-Mordruverse reboot
• Cover: one of the last Legion projects Curt Swan worked on before his death.
• Page 1 panel 2: They were marooned on Grocz on 11/30, let's say they found the freighter on 12/1 and spent the day en route to Zirr, arriving the night of the 1st. Rokk, Laurel, and Rond take a day of R&R on Zirr with baby Lauren, while the others go to Winath. Grocz was mentioned once, it was listed on the Legion's interplanetary clock: when it's 1:27 on Earth, it is 8:49 on Grocz (ADV 312)
• Page 1 panel 3: Zirr was the homeworld of Mon-El’s friends Garl and Englen, who belong to a race of yellow-skinned, dome-headed humanoids (ADV 321). Tom Bierbaum’s IOKIAS has more.
• Page 7: we already met Liggt, in Cham’s nightmare flashback in which the brothers fought to the death. Ji Daggle was introduced as Reep’s mom back in the Dagon the Avenger story (SLSH 258).
• Page 14: the 20th century legacy of Lar Gand – is this the first time we’ve seen the name “Valor”? Note that we saw Lar Gand join the L.E.G.I.O.N. in the 20th century in issue 16 of that title.
• Page 15: the ADV 247 costumes
• Page 16: the new first case (try to bring in Doyle) and the traditional first case (the Quintile Crystal, as seen in DC Super-Stars 17)
• Page 17: Lucifer 7 was the first case that Tinya & Lu helped work on (from Secrets of the LSH #1); Tinya broke up a spy ring as seen in the recent Secret Origins 42 story
• Page 18: Nine Worlds Ice Cream, first seen in ADV 247. That’s Chris Sprouse and his soon-to-be wife in panel 4. Notice the Kathoon ice cream on the menu, so everyone take a drink.
• Page 20 panel 2: Lester Spiffany was the son of a rich jewel dealer, who tried to buy his way into the Legion (ADV 301). He first appeared in 2974 (modified timeline) and this is 2994, 20 years later, so “Spiffany” could be either the son at roughly age 35 or his father Horace in his 50s-60s.
• Page 21 panel 4: “Lar brought me out to visit his friends”, that’s Garl and Englen.
• Page 22 panel 5: Englenna, named after Garl and Englen
• Omnicom 1: 
• Gail Ken and Via Edwards named after prolific letter writers Ken Gale and Ed Via
• BI subsidiaries are leading suppliers of anti-grav belts, communications systems (both later extensively used by the Legion), and energy plants; Brande is a key financier of time travel (played a big part in Legion lore) and tele-psychic techniques
• Omnicom 2: 
• King Jonn of Pasnic (named for Nick Pascale) was first seen in SBOY 193 “the War Between the Nights and the Days”, where we see Luornu get a new costume. 
• Somi Gan is Life Lass of the Heroes of Lallor. We saw her only once during the Baxter run (issue 62), and her last appearance before that was LSH v2 #317 in a Heroes of Lallor story.
• “The United Resistance Militia” – that's a new one!

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Here's what we know of the timeline to date. I'm color coding them based on whether the date appeared in the 2995 Sourcebook (yellow; text in yellow is as written in the Sourcebook), it's a confirmed date that was given in the comic (green), or an estimated date based on keeping track of events and days (cyan). Bold text is something new added this issue. Italics are unknown dates.

• 2949 – The Durlan (later RJ Brande) arrives at the old Metropolis Spaceport and meets Marla Latham (LSH v4 #8)
• 2959 – Brande Industries formed (LSH v4 #8)
• 2/8/72 – Assets Magazine story on Brande Industries (LSH v4 #8)
• 6/23/89 – Magic Wars end (LSH v3 #63)
• 10/89 – the Great Collapse
• 4/90 – Validus Plague ravages Winath; former Legionnaire Brainiac 5 helps (LSH v4 #3).
• 4/13/90 – Communique from Earthgov President Wellington, trying to legally disband the Legion, with Imra, Rokk, and Cham “currently out of the picture” (LSH v4 #1).
• 4/12/91 – Tinya goes missing (LSH v4 #2)
• 5/8/91 – Search for Tinya called off; Sun Boy is leader (LSH v4 #2)
• 6/9/91 – Planned date of wedding of Tinya and Jo (LSH v4 #2)
• TBD 2991 – Garth and Imra, having left the Legion, start the Lightning Ring Plantation (LSH v4 #3)
• 1/21/92 – Rebirth Summit (LSH v4 #1)
• 7/6/92 – LSH leader Polar Boy disbands the Legion, mentions Black Dawn which “cost” the Legion (LSH v4 #1).
• 7/6/92 – LSH leader Polar Boy disbands the Legion, mentions Black Dawn which cost the Legion (LSH v4 #1); Mordru coronated as the Supreme Teacher of Sorceror’s World (LSH v4 #6)
• Wed 10/22/94 – Raid on anti-government terrorists, but ringleader Vidar (aka Universo) is not captured; Cham tells Marla he’s leaving (LSH v4 #1).
• Thu 10/23/94 – Cham begins to recruit members for the new Legion, first approaching Rokk; Vi leaves the Imsk army for Winath; Dominator agents help someone escape from Labyrinth (LSH v4 #1).
• Fri 10/25/94 – Attack on Jo and Kono on Rimbor; Loomis and Lydda en route to Kathoon (LSH v4 #2).
• Mon 11/17/94 – Article in InterFaces magazine about the Lightning Ring Plantation (LSH v4 #3)
• Fri 11/21/94 – Blok is killed by Roxxas the Butcher (LSH v4 #3).
• Thu 11/27/94 – Mordru crushes Rond Vidar’s ring; Rokk and Cham finally meet up with Jo and decide to go to Tharn to rescue Mysa; Dominators and Shvaughn Erin watch the tape of Roxxas and Blok, whose body is delivered to Winath; Mon-El resurrected (LSH v4 #3).
• Fri 11/28/94 – Mon-El goes to Talok VIII, then Shadow Lass and Mon-El visit Brainiac 5, then Mon-El destroys the Time Trapper (LSH v4 #4)
• Sat 11/29/94 – Cham, Rokk, Jo, Kono, and Furball arrive on Tharn and are captured by Mordru; after being hired by Earthgov to find Blok’s killer, Celeste, Devlin, and Bounty leave for Trom (LSH v4 #6)
• Sun 11/30/94 – Celeste, Devlin, and Bounty meet Jan on Trom (LSH v4 #6); with the help of Laurel Gand, Rokk’s crew rescues Mysa and Rond from Mordru but are teleported to Grocz; Celeste, Devlin, Bounty, and Jan leave Trom for Winath (LSH v4 #7)
• Mon 12/1/94 – Rokk, Cham, Jo, Kono, Furball, Rond, Laurel, and Mysa travel from Grocz to Zirr (LSH v4 #8)
• Tues 12/2/94 – Rokk, Laurel, and Rond take some R&R time on Zirr with baby Lauren, while the others go to Winath; Marla reminisces (LSH v4 #8)
• April 2995 – Imra & Garth’s twins due (LSH v4 #3)

Unknown dates, presented in the order they were revealed in the comics:

• Black Dawn: something big and bad happened. Polar Boy says “you know what that cost us”. Sun Boy was a previous leader. By the time it happened, Chameleon Boy had left the Legion and “watched everything fall to pieces” (LSH v4 #1). 
• Rokk and Loomis are injured in the Braal/Imsk War at Venado Bay, and Rokk lost his powers. Salu was somehow involved on the Imsk side, which did some questionably legal things. Imsk won, as the army is occupying Braal. (LSH v4 #1)
• At some point, the Science Police Earth splintered off from the main Science Police (referred to as Science Police Proper) (LSH v4 #2)