#m'onel

LEGIONNAIRES (vol. 1) #37 (June, 1996). Cover by Jeffrey Moy and W.C. Carani.

Outside of the original classic, this is my favorite of the many costumes Mon-El (Bar Gand) has had over the years.

This was from the period of time after Crisis On Infinite Earths/Man of Steel (1986) where there was no more Superboy, and the Superman editorial office had declared that anything related to Superman and Krypton was completely off limits to the Legion of Super-Heroes.

Much angst occurred at the Legion offices, which lead to heavy retconning of the Legion's history, and then several reboots. The Legionnaire most affected was Lar Gand, whose superhero name was changed to Valor because he could no longer be called Mon-El (the name was tied too closely to Superboy/Superman).

Luckily, writers Roger Stern and Tom McGraw came up with a way to return his original name (almost). Lar Gand dropped the Valor moniker and called himself M'Onel, which is Martian for "He Who Wanders."