First Look: Legion Of Super Heroes, Superman Returns

In what might qualify as the worst idea in the long sad history of bad ideas, the not-yet-launched CW network has announced its intent to produce a Legion Of Super Heroes series for broadcast later this year. Thanks to Superman Homepage for the scoop.
While “The Batman” has steadily increased in quality from a rather dismal first batch of episodes, they still have a long way to go before coming close to the legendary Batman The Animated Series. LSH intends to jump off that new “The Batman” continuity, as you can plainly see by the character designs. Justice League Unlimited touched on the Legion in Far From Home, but as you can see Brainiac 5 is way different looking and we’ve traded SuperGirl for a rather slender Superboy. Without seeing any actual animation, hearing any voices, or knowing plot details, its hard to say if this will be good or bad. But its easier to be pessimistic, so I’m running with that. Here’s the word direct from WB animation:

One thousand years from now, a group of teenage super heroes travel back in time to recruit the greatest hero of all, Superman, and enlist him their fight against evil in the 31st Century. While their intentions were good, their time travel skills were not, and Lightning Lad, Saturn Girl, Brainiac 5, Phantom Girl, Bouncing Boy and Timber Wolf end up going too far back into the past, accidentally retrieving the young Superboy instead. Together, this unlikely Legion of Super Heroes bands together to defend the rights of all free worlds and uphold the laws of the newly formed United Planets. That is, if they don’t kill each other first.

LEGION OF SUPER HEROES combines humor with high-stakes, grand-scale super heroics to create the ultimate sci-fi, super hero fantasy for kids of all ages. Each episode of this fast-paced, character-driven action comedy will pit Superboy and the Legion against otherworldly threats and adversaries who challenge the team on both super heroic and emotional levels. The series is executive produced by Sander Schwartz, and produced by Linda Steiner and James Tucker for Warner Bros. Animation.

On somewhat related news, some really exciting Superman Returns footage has been released from an odd source: Coca-Cola. They’re featuring a few seconds of Supes flying through Metropolis and the much talked about Airplane sequence in a new ad campaign. You can see the relevant parts of this commercial from a download on Aint-It-Cool or just stop fast forwarding your TiVo and watch a commercial break sometime.