Tuesday, November 02, 2010

In the Legion's future, apparently the ocean's only three feet deep:


According to DC's Wikia, Validus was about 15 feet tall. But that seemed to vary quite a bit, depending on the artists. Here, Validus has just crashed to earth like a meteorite (he couldn't fly) and didn't seem to have waded very far out of the ocean, but seems to be standing easily.

Validus's strength level always seemed a little dicey to me as well: he was powerful enough that it took the combined strength of pre-Crisis Superboy and Mon-El to hold him, but those two were strong enough to move a planet around alone. Perhaps not being able to fly, Validus always needs something to stand on in order to exert his strength; and maybe that's why you never saw those huge feats of strength from him. Or more likely, it was just one of those things that varied as needed depending on the plotline.

This issue: the day before election day on earth, when three computer selected candidates campaign for the Presidency of Earth. (While computer selection may not sound great, a one-day campaign season sounds pretty good!) Colossal Boy is dismayed to realize his mom is one of the candidates, but he (and the rest of the Legion) are about to have bigger fish to fry, as the unseen Dark Man approaches earth, with the Fatal Five paving the way for his arrival. This storyline would be the last for the Fatal Five as a whole, until after the reboot in Zero Hour. From Legion of Super-Heroes#269, "Who Shall Name the Dark Man?" Written by Gerry Conway, art by Jimmy James and Frank Chiaramonte.

2 comments:

Rottgutt said...

DC's Wikia also lists Validus' weight as 750 lbs. At 15 feet tall and 750 lbs, he'd be beyond skeletal...

Mikelibrarian said...

I always thought Validus was about 50 feet tall. He's holding Mon El as though he were a GI Joe doll on the cover on that particular comic and in Superboy and the Legion of Superheroes #246, Colossal Boy was only able to achieve parity with him.