The Legion of Substitute Heroes

he Legion of Substitute Heroes were founded by Polar Boy, Night Girl, Stone Boy, Fire Lad, and Chlorophyll Kid, five young heroes whose powers were not sufficient to earn them membership in the Legion of Superheroes. After receiving a consolation prize (a Legion flight belt), the five disconsolate teenagers decided to form a group that could pinch hit for the Legion. After several failures as superheroes, the Subs manage to save the Earth from an invasion by Plant Men while the Legion is off planet fighting a decoy armada of robot space ships.

At first operating in secrecy, the Legion of Substitute Heroes is gradually recognized by the real Legion as a valuable asset. Members of the Legion of Substitute Heroes include:

• Antenna Lad has the power to tune into any broadcast from any era, but mostly at random.
• Chlorophyll Kid (Ral Benem from the planet Mardru) has the power to make plants grow super fast. He gained this power after falling into a vat of super plant growth formula as a small child. He has stated at various times that he can only accelerate plant growth, not control plant life, although some of his appearances seemed to contradict this.
• Color Kid (Ulu Vakk from the planet Lupra) can change the color of objects. Gained his power after being struck by a ray from another dimension. In the 1985 Legion of Substitute Heroes one-shot comic, he was temporarily known as Color Queen after being exposed to Granderian Gender-Reversal Germs by Infectious Lass.
• Double-Header has two heads as a result of gradually splitting into two identical beings.
• Fire Lad (Stag Mavlen from the planet Schwar) gained the power to breathe fire (often accidentally, as he suffers from allergies that cause him to sneeze) after inhaling vapors from a crashing meteor.
• Infectious Lass (Drura Sepht) spontaneously generates infectious diseases.
• Porcupine Pete (Peter Dursin) has quills he can shoot from his body (although generally not very accurately).
• Stone Boy (Dag Wentim from the planet Zwen). The people of Zwen gained the power to turn into stone as a way of hibernation on a planet whose night is six months long. Throughout most of his appearances, Stone Boy could only transform into an inanimate, insensate stone statue and was often used in humorous ways (e.g. being dropped on a villain from above by his teammates), or at best as a distraction while the other "Subs" carried out some mission. However, during the Five Year Gap, he underwent hypnotherapy and gained the ability to stay conscious during his transformation and, eventually, even to move in his stone state.
• "Arm Fall Off Boy"' (Floyd Belkin of the planet Lallor) has the ability to detach his own limbs at will. His background was largely unexplored, but in the post-Zero Hour version of the comic he tried out for Legion membership in Legionnaires #43 (December 1996) using the name Splitter. He made it through the initial interview and was one of five finalists, only to literally fall apart under fire during the last test. He went on to join the Heroes of Lallor.