The Legion of Super-Heroes #272
Legion of Super-Heroes #272 carries a double burden of historical significance: it formally inaugurates Blok as the first new Legionnaire of the 1980s decade, completing a two-year arc that transformed a former villain into one of the team's most enduring members, and it simultaneously serves as the debut vehicle for the entire revived Dial H for Hero concept. The 16-page insert tucked between pages thirteen and fourteen marks the first appearance of Chris King and Vicki Grant — two characters whose reader-participation premise, in which fans submitted every hero and villain identity, anticipated crowd-sourced storytelling decades before the internet made it trivial. As the launch pad for a franchise that would run through Adventure Comics and into The New Adventures of Superboy, this issue is the ground-zero document for one of DC's most genuinely interactive Bronze Age experiments.
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The Legion lead story was written by Gerry Conway with pencils broken down by Steve Ditko and finished by Frank Chiaramonte, under editor Jack C. Harris with Joe Orlando as managing editor; the cover was pencilled by Jimmy Janes and inked by Dick Giordano. The Dial H for Hero insert was written by Marv Wolfman — then at the peak of his New Teen Titans success — and drawn by Carmine Infantino, with different inkers across its pages. The three Legion Academy applicants Nightwind, Crystal Kid, and Lamprey were themselves the product of an earlier reader-submission contest, their designs having first appeared in The Amazing World of DC Comics #12 and #14, making the participatory ethic embedded in the issue doubly layered.
Trivia · 8 facts
- First appearance of Chris King (a.k.a. Christopher King) and Vicki Grant, the dual protagonists of the revived Dial H for Hero feature, both debuting in a 16-page insert story written by Marv Wolfman and drawn by Carmine Infantino.
- Blok formally joins the Legion of Super-Heroes in this issue, stopping the escaped Starburst Bandits single-handedly after defeating them where the other Academy applicants could not; he becomes the first Legionnaire inducted in the 1980s.
- The issue contains Blok's retold secret origin — a significant revision and expansion of the backstory first sketched in Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes #253 (July 1979), where he debuted as a villain in the League of Super-Assassins.
- The Dial H insert introduces hero identities — Futura, The Moth, Mega Boy, Sunspot, G.L.U.N.K., and The Flying Buttress — all created by named reader submissions; villain and hero designs by fans such as Danny Vozzo (The Moth), Jim Simpers (Futura), Steve Mattson (The Flying Buttress), David Cason (Mega Boy), and Shawn Sherman (Sunspot).
- Academy applicants Nightwind, Crystal Kid, and Lamprey also make appearances; all three were originally designed by Legion fans whose submissions were published in The Amazing World of DC Comics #12 and #14.
- The Dial H insert is physically inserted between pages 13 and 14 of the main Legion story and carries its own internal cover with a 'free' price notation; the feature continues in Adventure Comics #479.
- The main story was scripted by Gerry Conway with Steve Ditko providing breakdowns and Frank Chiaramonte finishing the art; the cover was pencilled by Jimmy Janes and inked by Dick Giordano.
- The issue has been reprinted in multiple collected editions, including The Steve Ditko Omnibus Vol. 2 (DC, 2012) and Legion of Super-Heroes: Before the Darkness #2 (DC, 2021/2022), confirming its durability as a reference point in Legion history.
Cast · 40 characters
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Full plot ⚠ may contain spoilers
▸ Reveal full plot — may contain spoilers
Wildfire and Dawnstar are testing four applicants to see which will join the Legion. As former enemy Blok recounts his origin, the team is called to recapture the escaped Starburst Bandits. Blok is admitted to the team for stopping the villains single-handedly.
Plot details indexed by the Grand Comics Database (CC BY-SA).