Brainiac 5 questions

[Randy Jackson]

Was it ever confirmed that Brainiac 5 inherited his force field from Brainiac? As I recall, that force field was pretty strong. IIRC, in Brainiac's first appearance, Superman punched it as hard as he could and did zero damage.

Brainiac 5's primary super power was his super intelligence. Anything he created that helped him or other Legionnaires fight was more of less expected. In the short-lived Legion of Superheroes cartoon,he had a mech suit similar to Iron Man's armor that he would put on if he got caught in a fight. Has he ever created something like that in the comics?

Speaking of his force field belt, was it ever explained why he didn't make them available to other Legionnaires (I imagine the main reason was because no one thought about it). I imagine it could have been very useful to some of the team with less physical powers like Saturn Girl, Dream Girl and Princess Projectra. 

[Philip Portelli]

In the Legion animated series, Brainiac 5 didn't wear armor. He was a full-on, for-reals android able to alter his form.

His force field belt has been around since his first appearance in Action Comics #276 which implies that he had improved on the original Brainiac's designs by condensing it. His belt has been destroyed in the past and he has always been able to rebuild it. It may require some rare element to make it work so it would be next to impossible to mass produce it, like most super-scientific devices that super-heroes use! 

In fact, in Adventure Comics #303, it could be construed that Brainy has access to his "ancestor's" shrinking technology.

[Randy Jackson]

So the force field could stop kryptonite radiation? I would think no matter how rare the materials were That Superboy or Supergirl would have been happy to gather them so he could make belts for them. Even if they didn't wear themall the time, just having them to handle kryptonite would have been useful. 

[Philip Portelli]

It was only shown doing that specifically in that one issue. He gave that belt to Supergirl but it quickly stopped working back in her own time. He apparently never made another. Perhaps he built a special belt just for her to 1) make up for what his "ancestor" did and 2) to impress her!

Randy Jackson said:

So the force field could stop kryptonite radiation? I would think no matter how rare the materials were That Superboy or Supergirl would have been happy to gather them so he could make belts for them. Even if they didn't wear themall the time, just having them to handle kryptonite would have been useful. 

[Luis Olavo de Moura Dantas]

There was a Keith Giffen issue shortly after the death of Time Trapper (and the second Duo Damsel body) where her and Bouncing Boy consider presenting the belt Force Field as a power of sorts in order to justify her permanence in the Legion.

They decide against it, on the grounds that artificial powers are not acceptable for that purpose.  But that does not really explain why Brainiac 5 never presented copies of his belt to other Legionnaires.  I assume that early on the implied reason was respect for their vanities.  Early LSH was very much about impressing each other and showing their prowess.

[Peter Wrexham]

I've just acquired the trade paperback collected edition of the Legion: Secret Origin mini-series from 2011-2012, written by Paul Levitz.  This obviously relates to a version of the Legion that isn't quite the same as the original Silver Age version.  However, it does depict a Legion that seems reasonably close to the one that I first encountered in the sixties and seventies.

In this version of the Legion, Brainiac 5 describes the force shield belt as a "family secret".  Later, he says "The power source is unique.  Lack of ability to duplicate it limits its utility."  Later still, when specifically asked to make another, he describes it as "necessarily unique".

So there's a retconned answer to two of Randy's questions.

[Captain Comics]

Man, somebody turn on the Silver Age Signal for Commander Benson! This is right up his alley.

I seem to remember that Mon-El's serum was made from super-rare materials, which is why he could only get small doses at a time. Although with Element Lad on the team, how is that a problem? Maybe I'm misremembering.

I don't remember anything about why B5's force-shield belt (I believe it was called force-shield, and not force-field, but I could be wrong) wasn't shared with his compatriots. At the very least, give one to Duo Damsel, before she becomes Mono Maid.

If there can only be one, it should be used on away missions by the weakest member while Brainiac 5 toils away in his lab. Which probably has its own force-shield.

My problem answering this question is, of course, that there have been so many iterations of the Legion. When I was a kid, I memorized all the Legionnaires' real names and home planets. This was Legion lore, this was information carved in stone. It was like memorizing the Periodic Table of Elements. It was Very Important Stuff.

But then it all changed. And changed again. And again. Really, after Crisis on Infinite Earths I didn't bother memorizing any DC information, because I knew it was subject to change. It seemed pointless to pay attention to continuity, since DC wasn't. Besides, I can always look anything up on the Internet that I need to know. Here's one website that tries to keep track of the changes, bless their pointy heads.

[Captain Comics]

And I just remembered something related. Some people used to wonder why Tony Stark didn't make armor for all his fellow Avengers. (Although Thor probably wouldn't need armor.) But then What If? #3 (first series) answered the question. In this world the Avengers disbanded when the Hulk left. But then the events of Avengers #3 happened, and Stark built armor for Hank Pym, Janet Van Dyne and Rick Jones to fight the Hulk/Namor team-up.

It didn't go well. And as was axiomatic in early What If? stories, Tony Stark died.

[Randy Jackson]

I remember that story fondly. And it did make sense for Tony to build those armors...well, at least for Rick Jones. The Wasp has always been about elusiveness and speed, so the armor migtt have hampered her mobility. Making Giant-man stronger and able to fly would be...actually, that would probably be a good idea. 

Captain Comics said:

And I just remembered something related. Some people used to wonder why Tony Stark didn't make armor for all his fellow Avengers. (Although Thor probably wouldn't need armor.) But then What If? #3 (first series) answered the question. In this world the Avengers disbanded when the Hulk left. But then the events of Avengers #3 happened, and Stark built armor for Hank Pym, Janet Van Dyne and Rick Jones to fight the Hulk/Namor team-up.

It didn't go well. And as was axiomatic in early What If? stories, Tony Stark died.

[Captain Comics]

I've often said that I find it hard to take any superhero seriously who has no defense against a gun. Even little fish bad guys have guns, and those guns are getting more sophisticated every year. To me, Hank Pym's power to grow big just made him a bigger target for any thug robbing a bodega, even back in the Silver Age. Especially if they aimed for his eye, which would be as big as an archery target. Heck, with today's AR-15s, or the tommyguns of the 1960s, you don't even have to aim much -- just spray the general area.

Worst of all, his power to grow big didn't make him as strong as Thor or Iron Man, which made him utterly superfluous on the Avengers. He was more useful as Ant-Man, which Roy Thomas apparently realized, reverting him to insect size with his Yellowjacket persona (through a convoluted maneuver). Plus, as Yellowjacket, his nom du combat joined the wasp family, which made his partnership with Wasp more aesthetically pleasing.

But yeah, he could have benefited from the armor, if his ego would have allowed. He's about the only one who would benefit, until the second Avengers era, when Hawkeye and Scarlet Witch came along, both mostly defenseless against a bunch of guys shooting guns in their direction.

But getting back to the Legion, most of them had no defense against bullets -- or the 30th century equivalent -- and could benefit from a force-shield.

[Philip Portelli]

Not only did the Legion have more deaths than any other group (outside the Suicide Squad and Strikeforce: Morituri), if you go through their entire Adventure Comics alone, they have the most injuries of any team!

So yeah, some protection would have been prudent!

[Richard Willis]

In fact, in Adventure Comics #303, it could be construed that Brainy has access to his "ancestor's" shrinking technology.

I was around for the earliest Legion stories but not after the original Brainiac was outed as an android*.

I don't remember if I've heard the explanation for Brainiac-5's relationship to him.

* A bone-headed move, IMO, since he already had a descendent.

[Luis Olavo de Moura Dantas]

It was revealed early in Superman #167 (1964) that Brainiac 5 isn't a descendant of the original Brainiac, but of Brainiac 2 (later known as Vril Dox II), who was playing the role of Brainiac's son for a while in order to further Brainiac's goals.

A very short appearance, but it does state that Brainiac 2 and Brainiac 5 are related to each other, not to the original Brainiac.