Adventure Comics 500

Adventure Comics #500 Preboot » Pre-Crisis Reprint Front and back cover by Keith Giffen and Larry Mahlstadt Story title Various Previous story Adventure Comics #499 (previous chronological reprints) Next story Adventure Comics #501 (next chronological reprints) Cover date June 1983 Creators Writer(s) n/a Penciller(s) n/a Inker(s) n/a Letterer(s) n/a Colourist(s) n/a Editor(s) Nicola Cuti Cover artist(s) Keith Giffen and Larry Mahlstadt

Background

Adventure Comics was the birthplace of the Legion and its longtime home. After almost 500 issues of publication, it became primarily a series of reprints. Featured each month was a chronological re-presentation of the Legion's earliest tales, two in each issue, beginning with their first appearance. While most issues of the series in this digest format also presented non-Legion material, as a way of celebrating this 500th issue, the page counted was extended from the normal 100 pages to 144, and eleven Legion stories were presented instead of the usual two.

Reprinted material

The Legion of Super-Heroes appears in all of the following stories (original publication source is noted for each):

• "The Secret of the Mystery Legionnaire" - Adventure Comics #305 (February, 1963)
• "The Legion of Substitute Heroes" - Adventure Comics #306 (March, 1963)
• "The Secret Power of the Mystery Super-Hero" - Adventure Comics #307 (April, 1963)
• "The Return of Lightning Lad" - Adventure Comics #308 (May, 1963)
• "The Legion of Super-Monsters" - Adventure Comics #309 (June, 1963)
• "The Doom of the Super-Heroes" - Adventure Comics #310 (July, 1963)
• "The War Between the Substitute Heroes and the Legionnaires" - Adventure Comics #311 (August, 1963)
• "The Super-Sacrifice of the Legionnaires" - Adventure Comics #312 (September, 1963)
• "The World of Doomed Olsens" (co-starring with Jimmy Olsen) - Superman's Pal, Jimmy Olsen #72 (October, 1963)
• "The Condemned Legionnaires" - Adventure Comics #313 (October, 1963)

The Story Behind the Stories

The two Legion reprints included in each issue of the digest-sized Adventure Comics were the feature attraction. As an added bonus to Legion fans, a running commentary about that issue's reprinted Legion stories was provided each month by Paul Levitz, who was the writer of the Legion's current series while the Adventure digests were being produced. Years later, these commentaries are the primary point of interest (other than the reprinted stories themselves), so the full text is provided below: