~*~

Robert’s Introduction:
There are a lot of reasons I love comics, but at the end of the day, it’s mostly because Superman once punched Dracula in the face.

How many settings have that level of elasticity? Would we buy superheroes showing up in a Twilight novel? No. What about Twilight characters showing up in a Deadpool comic? Absolutely. Hell, that thing I just described? That actually happened. Deadpool issue #30. Go look it up. I’ll wait.

Back? Cool. Moving on.

In most narratives, the rules are flexible, but solid. Your average urban fantasy setting has some basic protocols. Magic exists, yeah, there are werewolves and vampires, sure–but a robot dimension? Nazis on the moon? Amelia Earhart running a government agency that deals with invasions from alternate universes? Now you’re just being weird.

But in a superhero setting, anything is possible. Superman can punch Dracula. Batman can fight reptile people in the earth’s core. Zantanna can cast an invisibility spell by saying ‘Elbisivni’. The weird isn’t just possible; it’s probable. In a comic book universe, the weird is standard operating procedure.

And this is why I love superhero comics. Because rather than just recreate our world except with werewolves, they celebrate the bizarre. They blend science fiction and fantasy together into a frothy mixture and pour it down our throats. The best superhero comics aren’t about dark, gritty, washed out worlds where men in tights fight crime–they’re about the strange, the hideous, the beautiful, the intense. They’re worlds full of color–some of them darker than black, some of them brighter than the sun.

And this is why I love Legion of Nothing–because while its characters occupy a world where the danger is real and death lurks around every corner, it doesn’t forget that these are heroes. Flawed, sure. Just kids, absolutely. But they’re good guys, fighting the weird fight. Rather than parody or deconstruct it, Legion of Nothing celebrates superheroes and all their strangeness.

You can keep your violent re-imaginations and deconstructions of the superhero genre; I want stories that embrace the weird. To that end, I’ve hijacked this narrative with my own piece of Legion of Nothing fanfiction. I beg your pardon in advance if it’s a little stranger than what you’re accustom to–my settings probably tend to be a little more ‘unhinged’ than Jim’s. Hopefully, you’ll enjoy it, and not hold the fact that Jim allowed me to post this here against him.

Thanks for reading.
Continue reading The Omnisphere: Part 1 →