Living Legends 21 Notes

The contest from last chapter is still going by the way. If you can figure it out, I will have that fancy piece of clothing shipped right out. Spoilers ahead, so go read the chapter first!

Chapter 21 is a big one. This serves as a major set up to actually move towards the finish of the Dominique storyline. We open with Ace and Fear Lass on Airlab. Airlab, like New Salem, will be making an appearance in upcoming chapters of Out For Vengeance but for now it is a mighty fine place for a battle between our heroes and a new team of super-villains. Unlike just about every other character that popped up in previous chapters, no legacy comes attached to the criminals. I just needed four thug villains. Usually I’ll plum the piles of old story plots I have dating back to my high school years, but I took a different tack with these ones. I pulled out my old copy of the classic TSR Marvel Super Heroes Role-Playing Game and randomly generated all four. After that, I designed personalities around their classes, powers, and talents, and voila, I had more than enough for a team of criminals. Sometimes one dimensional characters can stay one dimensional, and these four, much like the Lady Foulplays in chapters past, probably will. At least for now.

We leave Mary Lee in place for the time being as we move in to the continuance of Atoman’s saga. More next chapter.

We know Robert “Lash Lightning” Morgan has ties to Dominique. Now one of our heroes gets the first hints of what is actually going on at the Chateau. What Isobel can do about it during a fragile pregnancy remains to be seen.

And, finally, our lost heroes return to reality, months after they disappeared, but only a few minutes for them. Doctor Frost’s own arrogance works against him, and this little band of heroes is suddenly without a leader. But they are far from through. Ghost Woman and Blackout both have places to go still.

And they will do it over our next two chapters. Over the next two weeks, we will hit both Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, as each of the characters celebrate (or at least survive) in a different way.

Living Legends 20 Notes (now with a contest!)

It’s hard to believe I am already up to the twentieth chapter.

For the first time in the book, I establish a group of potential spin-off characters. While the Next Gen will be appearing for the rest of the current story arc of Living Legends, I actually designed the team (in a slightly different form) as an entirely separate concept. As I fleshed out Dominique’s experiments and their results, I realized I could dove-tail the origins together quite nicely. A few name changes to tie them in with some really obscure Golden Age character names and voila! Yeah for syncronicity.

I didn’t forget about Purge. We will have more with the killer very soon.

We have an important moment in the progression of our first volume right here. The Atoman and Black Owl relationship is one I have built up over the last dozen chapters and I promise you that it is far from over yet.

Can you say team-up? I think you can. We will have a lot more with Fear-Lass and Ace the Amazing Boy in the first of three chapters next month! Yes, I did say three chapters! We have a special Christmas story coming up, and I am not going to delay that until after the holiday! So be ready for a triple dose of Living Legends next month.

Now for the contest of the day: can you tell me which nineties movie partially inspired the six young heroes that make up Buster’s Next Gen and their personalities? A first name or two may even have been lifted. I may just have a piece of Metahuman Press swag for whomever guesses correctly....

Living Legends 19 Notes

This is it: the chapter we finally see what happened to the heroes trapped in the abyss sphere.

Ghost Woman’s powers and identity get taken to a new level as we realize she is far more than we ever expected from her previous appearances. Her identity crisis and alter egos will become a major part of Living Legends in the months to come.

Blackout gets his own cure as the abyss sphere somehow remedies his loss of intelligence. The mute Blackout will also get to do more than act like an animal upon his return to the real world.

Hey, remember when Marcus Bennett was another spy for Dominique? No? Well, he is, the no good dirty rat! But now Doctor Frost is beginning to get the clues he needs to finally figure out the mystery behind Dominique and her allies. I think Frost has really started to gain a voice with this issue, even if that voice is Jack Bauer.

And it all comes down to the Green Lama. I’ve waited eighteen issues to finally introduce one of my favorite Golden Age characters to the story of Living Legends. Originally, I planned to make Lama one of the initial Legends, but as I worked my way through the characters I realized he could be far too powerful among the initial eighteen. We wouldn’t want him to show up Atoman, nor did I want to make a second hero in trouble with the government. So Lama got pushed back. But Jethro Dumont is finally here, and he is here to stay.

Next month, it is back to the characters in the real world as we begin the progression in to the next stage of the mystery of the time-jump.

Living Legends 18 Notes

The Lady Fairplay / Foulplay story moves forward and we get some of the first clues towards one of the over-arching story arcs of Living Legends. More on this in future chapters.

Charles Chandler, although a very health mid-eighty year old in this story, is another golden age hero. In his case, he used to use the classic name Crimebuster. A very strange character that was somewhere between standard superhero, pulp hero, and Archie-style comedy romance. Now he will be a key figure in the evolving conspiracy as it takes center stage over the next few chapters.

Yep, a baby for Isobel. More in future chapters.

Did you think the Atoman / Black Owl story was over? No, my friends, it has only just begun.

Next month: What happened to Blackout, Dr. Frost, and Ghost Woman?