Legion of Super-Heroes

• Directed by Jeff Wamester
• February 7, 2023
• Based on Legion of Super-Heroes created by Otto Binder and Al Plastino

Voice Cast

• Kara Zor-El/Supergirl-Meg Donnelly
• Brainiac 5-Harry Shum Jr.
• Kal-El/Clark Kent/Superman-Darren Criss
• Barry Allen/The Flash-Matt Bomer
• Bruce Wayne/Batman-Jensen Ackles
• Dawnstar-Cynthia Hamidi
• Tinya Wazzo/Phantom Girl-Gideon Adlon
• Charles Taine/Bouncing Boy-Ely Henry       
• Brin Londo/Timber Wolf, Brainiac 4-Robbie Daymond
• Mon-El-Yuri Lowenthal
• Rokk Krinn/Cosmic Boy, Condo Arlik/Chemical King-Eric Lopez
• Brainiac, Cyrus Gold/Solomon Grundy-Darin De Paul
• Floyd Belkin/Arms-Fall-Off Boy, Brainiac 2-Ben Diskin
• Tasmia Mallor/Shadow Lass-Victoria Grace
• Alura In-Ze-Jennifer Hale
• Luornu Durgo/Triplicate Girl/Duplicate Girl-Daisy Lightfoot
• Jacques Foccart/Invisible Kid, Brainiac 3-Zeno Robinson

Supergirl is sent to the future where she trains alongside the Legion of Super-Heroes from the 31^st century and confronts the terrorist organization the Dark Circle.

I have been a little iffy on the latest batch of DCAU films. The RWBY crossover was not that good and Warworld was pretty much the same. What excited me to try this movie was the presence of the Legion of Super-Heroes. I greatly enjoyed the all too brief two season series so to see them get a DCAU project made me giddy with excitement.

Some have compared the Legion of Super-Heroes to Star Trek (at least TOS back in the day) because of its popularity and its fans. It certainly has a cult following and is very science-fiction oriented. I would say though it’s closer to the original iteration of the Guardians of the Galaxy. It’s set in the far-off future as well and has deep ties to its particular company’s core mythology. Yet it’s also not well-known beyond comic book fans if at all.

The first thing Legion of Super-Heroes gets right is it completely separates Supergirl from the Justice League. How does it do this? Time travel though I questioned the casual use of it here. Why is she separated? Supergirl’s powers are not well controlled, but Superman just comes up with the idea of chucking her in the year 3000 as if it’s no different than sending her to the grocery store to pick up some eggs. But it does allow for the focus of the story to not only be on Supergirl but eliminates using the Justice League as a narrative crutch. 

Legion of Super-Heroes also gives the character of Supergirl some hard choices to make even if it initially starts the story with her deciding to stay in the future based on the first cute guy she sees. When they did that I really thought I was going to hate this. Such a shallow reason is usually the highpoint of any story that engages in such with it being all downhill afterwards. Not so this time around.

They manage some good character moments on the part of Brainiac 5 and Supergirl. That’s the core relationship of this whole film. Supergirl is feeling lost without her home since unlike Superman she’s old enough to actually remember Krypton. Brainiac 5 is trying to move beyond the legacy of his family. Here they create the beginnings of a reluctant romance between the two characters. They start off hating each other but by the end there is an attraction and it works! It’s not forced, but rather as natural as they can do in 83 minutes. 

I am unfamiliar with the Black Circle who are the foot soldiers of our main villain. Maybe they were mentioned in the Legion of Super-Heroes TV show and I just forgot. It has been a bit since I last watched it. What I liked though was that while the Justice League encounters them in the past there was no plot development in any way, shape, or form. They were just some weirdos who gave Solomon Grundy a super gun.

The plot centers around the Miracle Machine which is one of those all-powerful pieces of weird technology replete in so much science fiction. Our villain has foreseen a threat (and given the Crisis on Infinite Earths storyline currently being released we can assume what that threat is) but why did it take over 1000 years to finally get the Miracle Machine? He was competent enough to stay hidden for all that time but not obtain the device? Selective incompetence?

But more importantly, there’s a feeling of fun in this. It’s serious for the characters and exciting but it’s also fun without undermining the story itself. It embraces a spirit of enjoyable adventure while also having serious ramifications for the characters. It is not an inconsequential set of events.

At 83 minutes it feels like much more of a movie than it actually is. Then again they don’t waste any time with extraneous nonsense. And that’s accomplished because they’re not using the better-known characters as a crutch. 

With a good story and a thrilling finale, Legion of Super-Heroes is a fine addition to the DCAU catalog. I had some reservations because of other DC offerings but this bodes well for what’s to come. If you like the previous DC animated films then this one will certainly satisfy you!