Valor #22 annotations: End of an Era part 2

Annotations for Valor #22:

• On sale 6/14/94 (same day as last week's Legionnaires #17)
• Legion of Substitute Podcasters episode 715 (June 27, 2022)
• Timeline: 9/30/2995

Notes:

• Cover: That’s Troy “Tyroc” Stewart between Dev-Em and Andromeda
• Valor is finally and fully integrated with the other two 30th century books now. When we last saw Valor (last month in issue 21), he had just been cast into the Phantom Zone again in August 1994, and he doesn’t get out until January 2975 (a mere 981 years later); this is the adult Valor in Sept 2995, who has already been out for 20 years.
• Page 1: In the captions, Valor is having trouble remembering his own story, after 2000 years in the Phantom Zone.
• Sebastopol is most likely the major port city in the Crimean peninsula of Ukraine, which was annexed by Russia in 2014 (and not the California town)
• Page 4 panel 1: “a battle between Lobo and Darkseid” recalls the Quiet Darkness
• Page 4 panel 2: The SCPA is the Space Canine Patrol Agents
• Page 4 panel 3:
• “Isle of Avalon” – referring to the recent Annual, also the King Arthur story
• “Frozen in an iceberg” – Captain America
• “Cursed to sleep until my 16th birthday” – Sleeping Beauty
• Page 5 panel 2: We haven’t seen Brande since issue 39, right after the Earth blew up
• Page 5 panel 4: Valor tells Brande that Jo is on a mission; ironically, the mission is visiting the woman who Brande was switched in time for years ago by Glorith. Jo is in the 20th century, as seen in L.E.G.I.O.N. #68-70.
• Page 6 panel 2: That’s the Pocket Dimension Earth, last seen in Superman v2 #22 as a dead planet after the three Kryptonian villains killed everyone and Superman executed them for it
• Page 10 panel 2: “HAUUUU” is a new scream by Tyroc
• Page 12: I own this page of original art
• Page 14 panel 2: probably the first appearance of “Mon-El” since before the Mordruverse
• Page 19: sayonara to Tyroc and Computo II
• Page 20: farewell to Infectious Lass, Invisible Kid II, Andromeda, Fire Lad, Stone Boy, Color Kid – basically everyone except Valor, Shady, and Brande
• Page 21: computer counts down 72 hours until Pocket Earth explodes

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Cutting down the timeline to just the last few days of story as we get close to Zero Hour. I'm color coding them based on whether the date appeared in the 2995 Sourcebook (yellow), 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.

Due to the timelines in the stories bouncing between 2995 and 1994 and things happening "simultaneously" 1001 years apart, I'm keeping the events in the order that they happen to the people involved, not strictly chronological by day and year. To make it easier to follow, the 1994 dates will be in red text and anything outside of time (like at the beginning or end of time) will be in blue text.

• Thu 9/28/95: The Legion tries and fails to protect Starfinger III from the Khunds, while fighting the Legion Academy, the Khundish ex-Legionnaires, and the mind-controlled Heroes of Lallor; Polestar leaves for New Earth while the rest of the team go to Weber’s World; Valor finds something strange with Dev-Em; Rond Vidar finds something strange in the time stream (LSHv4 #57); Ayla is growing younger since the battle with Glorith, and to comfort her, Vi reads her a bedtime story (LSHv4 Ann #5).
• Fri 9/29/95: Arriving at Weber’s World, the team tries to stop the Khunds’ bombs from destroying the planet; Dawnstar arrives and meets Wildfire; Firefist kills Veilmist; and after studying at the Infinite Library, Glorith travels to Tharn where she restores Mordru’s powers to help her conquer the universe (LSHv4 #58). Meanwhile, SW6 Brainy & Triad find that Valor has been retconned from history (Valor #13, Legionnaires #16 pages 9-10), so a team of Legionnaires goes back in time to find out what happened (Valor #14, Legionnaires #16 page 10).
• Outside of time: the Legionnaires enter the time stream and crash their Time Bubble (Valor #15); the Legionnaires fight Valor and find out that Lori is Glorith (Valor #16), and then fight Glorith, but Valor succumbs to the effects of his lead poisoning and dies; SW6 Valor appears (Valor #17); Brainiac 5 tells SW6 Valor that he will have to spend another 1000 years in the Phantom Zone in order to save time, and Valor does not take it well (Valor #18), but the presence of Waverider and seeing his fellow Legionnaires vanish changes his mind. Once he accepts his fate, the Legionnaires appear back in their own time and the legend of Valor is restored (Valor #19, Legionnaires #16 page 11). From Vanishing Point, the Linear Men see a timequake affect the 30th century (Valor #20), which causes Dream Girl and Star Boy to appear (Legionnaires #16).
• The Legionnaires instantly return to their present, unaware of their meeting with Glorith and the Valors (Valor #15-19, Legionnaires #16 page 11); Star Boy, Dream Girl, and Bouncing Boy appear with the Legionnaires and Ferro Lad is long dead, leading Cosmic Boy, Saturn Girl, and Lightning Lad – who seem to be the only ones aware that something funny is going on – to take a Time Bubble to figure it out (even though Invisible Kid and Rond Vidar are secretly aware that something’s happening); Polestar appears at New Earth (Legionnaires #16, LSHv4 #59); Rond, SW6 Brainiac 5, and SW6 Invisible Kid arrive on Weber’s World in a time bubble at the same time as with Mon-El, Shadow Lass, and Dev-Em, but they're all too late to prevent the death of Laurel Gand from the Khund bomb; Jo leaves for 1994 to find Tinya (LSHv4 #59). The SW6 Legionnaires confront Polestar at New Earth (Legionnaires #17).
• Sat 8/6/1994: Valor tries to re-create the feats he did before he went into the Phantom Zone, but fails; the Linear Men watch Valor from Vanishing Point (Valor #20). As a result of the timeline issues, Valor splits into multiple copies of himself and manages to do all the things that legend said he did over the years, in just a few hours, then resigns himself to having Glorith send him back to the Bgztl Twilight dimension. But the Linear Men realize it’s too late, the future is doomed (Valor #21).
• Sun 8/7/1994: Jo Nah arrives from the future in the time bubble (L.E.G.I.O.N. #68). He meets who he thinks is Tinya, but it turns out to have been her cousin Enya all along. He wants to bring her back to the 30th century (L.E.G.I.O.N. #69).
• Sat 9/30/95: Laurel Gand is laid to rest on Shanghalla in a ceremony attended by a number of adult and SW6 Legionnaires, after which Glorith and Mordru attack the group with replicas of some of their old foes and kidnap Rokk, and then Dawnstar fades out (Legionnaires #17). Valor and others go to New Earth to help RJ Brande bring Pocket Earth into this universe, but while the Subs and several Legionnaires blink out of existence, Pocket Earth turns out to be unstable and will explode in 72 hours (Valor #22).