RKMBs Forums .::Robegories::. Comic Books CUB: DnA's big mistake?

Hey, I like cute li'l babies too and stuff (for a few minutes at a time) but I cant help but wonder if bringing Cub to life so to speak so EARLY might not end up being DnA BIG Mistake.

I certainly don't want to see the cliche of rapid aging to adulthood... and now that the tyke's HERE, I don't want any harm to come to his cute li'l self...

I mean, there were other ways to cause tension for Tinya and Jo and bring Brin into the picture...

WAS Cub a misstep on DnA's part....?

I'm on record as not being a big fan of the Cub-growth storyline thus far.

As far as whether Cub will be DnA's big mistake, the birth of a child this early in the Legion's history seems an outgrowth of the existence of married Legionnaires at this point. The basic problem is that it's created an ambiguity about just how old the Legionnaires are supposed to be. On the one hand, there's the tendency to want it to be a teenage team, but, on the other, there's the tendency to want to have certain storylines that seem to require them being adults, e.g. Jo and Tinya finally ending up married, only to have serious problems in the relationship.

Part of this is inherent in the nature of the reboot. It took years and years for the preboot team to "grow up", get married, and have kids. etc. The biggest problem with the reboot is that, starting completely over from the beginning, it just takes too long to reintroduce all the elements that made the Legion the special thing that it was. It's similar to the problems that have surrounded the reintroduction of characters. On the one hand, everyone wants to see their favorite character back, on the other, to simply have everyone show up in the first few years of Legion history makes things overcrowded and seems forced. We all want back the classic elements of the Legion, such as families and kids, but to try to introduce them too quickly is just jarring.

...and that's my take on the issue. :)

At least Cub wasn't born fully grown, like Mork & Mindy's child...

EDE --

You have a point. It is somewhat jarring for the Legionnaires to leap into parenthood so soon.

Personally, I don't mind, though. In real life, teenagers get married (or want to get married) all the time, and, considering the circumstances Jo and Tinya found themselves in at the time (being trapped in the past, with Tinya having "died" and existing only in wraith form), I think it's understandable that they would take the plunge. They literally did not know what tomorrow would bring.

It's also understandable that the relationship has a few bumps in it. Jo and Tinya may or may not be teens, but they're still very young. Both have a lot of growing up to do. They may come to realize that they made a mistake by marrying so early. Or they may not.

I find this more realistic than the preboot version, in which, as you note, the Legionnaires waited decades (our time) before marrying and having kids. Realistically speaking, many of them would have married and hung up their hero booties years earlier.

There is also a tendency among Legion fans to want everything just so. Some want it to be just the way it was in the preboot. Some want only a favorable ending for our heroes (i.e., Jo and Tinya reconcile). Others call it out of character for Jo to have thoughts of another woman. (Out of character for the preboot version, maybe, but the current one is still developing.)

I think what DnA and other reboot writers have tried to do is recreate the Legion so that it's not exactly as it was in the past. This means that our heroes make mistakes that would have been unthinkable for them before. It also means that the ending we may wish for (Jo and Tinya reconciling, again) may not happen. It's an open book at this point. I'm fine with that, so long as it's a good story.

In either case, I, too, wish DnA would get on with the storyline. It's dragged out too long, which, as you noted, is another problem of the rebooted Legion and its large cast.

I'm pretty much of the 'mistake' opinion. The quick-growth bit is, as has been said, a pop culture cliche and kiddies in superhero strips are just problematic. Franklin Richards is, of course, the patron saint here, having been aged, deaged, mind-wiped, had his powers changed, ascended to godhood, created alternate worlds, been picked out for Celestialness . . . talk about not knowing what to do with a development.

The basic problem is that any superhero who has a kid would, if any type of responsible soul at all, retire from the business and raise the baba somewhere safe. (I never really followed the FF when Reed and Sue tried this, but didn't they quickly join the Avengers? Duh!) But that's impractical when they're supposed to be entertaining us with fistfights. So instead the kids and parents stay on the scene, and creatives decide they might as well do something with the sprogs, hence the outlandish plotlines.

I could stand it if Cub (HATE that 'name') was sent off to be raised by his granny.

Mind, I do miss baby Dox.

Preboot, I thought Imra and Garth's having children was handled incredibly well.

There must indeed!

And you're right about the Ranzz babies, Eryk, but weren't Garth and Imra retired for most of that time ie not an example of working heroes with kiddies? And didn't one get mislaid with Darkseid. Oops.

I just realized that in my previous post, I didn't answer the topic question -- do I think that Tinya having a baby was a mistake?

For all the reasons cited by others, the answer is probably yes. Not only is the "growing baby" plotline so old it should be ready for medicare, but other examples of super-heroes having kids haven't fared so well, either (Wanda and Vision's "imaginary" kids come to mind).

I do think her pregnancy was a natural development of the storyline. Even in the 31st century, accidents probably still happen. But what to do with it now? Even DnA seem unsure.

From the looks of the preview pages in the article about Batista beeing the new regular artist over on one of the news sites, the whole matter of Cub might be taking a drastic turn real soon.

Yo ZeroMan, welcome!

And I hope that drastic turn doesn't include harming the baby or aging him to adulthood...

I wouldn't go so far as to call it a "mistake" just yet, but nothing about Cub has been interesting to me at this point. I think heroes having babies has never really been handled well before and DnA have been falling into the same old traps -- whether or not it'll lead to anything interesting remains to be seen.

The problem with sprogs in comics, in general, is that unless they are "convieniently" aged, they tend to draw attention to the skewed time flow that comics neccessarily work with.

Franklin Richards is a good example of this; despite all his ageing and de-ageing, I'd expect him to be around his early teens by now, and that would add a few years to Sue (and Johnny) that wouldn't quite work, despite suspension of disbelief. How old was Johnny when Sue gave birth? 18, 19, 20? Add on 13 or 14 years to that, and you get a Johnny way too old for how he is depicted, or what works for his particular character within the confines of comic book storytelling.

So yeah, I reckon DnA have written themselves into a hole with Cub (Ugh!).

Terence, you're right about the "skewered time problem" in comics, as it relates to children.

This could be less of a problem in the Legion, though, since it does not take place in the present day. I see nothing wrong with DnA declaring, at some point, that Cub is a year old and, therefore, the Legionnaires have all aged a year, too. In fact, I would prefer greater attention to chronological detail, which was one of the few things I readily enjoyed about TMK.

Also, since the Legion doesn't take place in the present, there's no reason why they couldn't wait five years of our time to have the tyke start teething.

Adios Reality, TMK was my favourite Legion period, but I think we were in a minority. In effect, TMK, though continuing the logical progression of the Levitz years, altered the Legion radically from it's core concept-a grouping of futuristic teen heroes-hence the eventual re-boot.

Comic books, for better or worse, have to remain relatively static, or as Stan Lee once said, give the reader only the illusion of change (paraphrased).

Cub only embellishes flaws in time flow.

DnA have been aging the team as they go along. They did say that a year passed during the Lost story so they are doing a better job of at least aging the team some, even if it isn't a real time sort of thing.

I'm waiting to make a final opinion about Cub.

So, Cub is his name huh?

I'm not getting into this kid thing, I hope that DnA resolve this storyline soon. It would be nice to see a kid in comics that doesn't age quickly or need to be sent somewhere. But I trust DnA to make it interesting.