Harmonia Li appeared to be a mildly fleshed out character. While we never got her full origin, we knew of a couple things: she was a teacher, she had an extraordinarily long life, she bore some type of animosity to the Guardians of Oa, and has roots in China. This is pretty significant since Asian characters weren't really seen in the Legion beforehand, except those nasty souls who lived on the moon and Dragonmage who did not appear in this continuity. Oddly, both she and Dragonwing (her contemporary from the Retroboot) had Chinese descent, but not relating anyway to each other with any type of shared acknowledgement of heritage. Possibly Levitz didn't think it through enough with having someone who grew up with China in older times vs. someone who grew up in the the 31st century. That could have been a great point in universe building. Harmonia also seemed to be a good foil and a peer for Brainiac 5 . And she was even popular enough to be voted in as Deputy Leader for Phantom Girl.
Something I don't normally do but I would like to comment on is her costume.
First of all, I want to point out the black, red and yellow color scheme. These three colors are all significant in Chinese culture. We never saw this combo on a Legionnaire which is also a bonus. Second of all, the long coat which Portela flares out in the wind, giving a bit more visual appeal. The upper part though is very reminiscent of Chinese garb with the collar and overlap pieces. Overall, a very nice interpretation of her heritage without being kitschy.
I find Harmonia's powers to be somewhat undefined though. She was stated to be a natural (as opposed to unnatural) elemental.
Jesus, not these guys again. She appeared to be able to manipulate Earth, Air, Fire and Water, as we saw her use winds against an opponent but also pelt another with rocks, no wind involved. She was also able to create a rain storm on one occasion. She never really seemed to use fire though she could once sense that a residual fire was "natural."
She seems to be pretty powerful, but we don't get much innovation with her powers. To what extent could she control the weather, besides a thunderstorm? In vol 7 issue 7, Levitz has Sun Boy, Element Lad and Chemical Kid try to deal with a Sea of Fire. Not to dismiss Sun Boy's handling of the situation, but I feel it was more a job for Harmonia than the boys, then we could have seen if her abilities had a limit. I caution though that she should not be like Crystal from the Inhumans who seems to be immensely powerful. That type of power creep would make other Legionnaires obsolete.
I feel like Harmonia's Chinese background could have been explored more through her powers. The Chinese elements actually differ from what most consider the 4 "classical" elements. The Chinese elements are Fire, Metal, Earth, Wood and Water. The 5 Chinese work in different ways to overcome or generate - yin and yang, and thereby balance or harmony. It's just a nitpick that I think would actually have made the character seem much more thoughtful, with being cliche like Dragonwing, running around with dragons on her robe and breathing fire.
She was probably one of the better characters that came out of the Retroboot volumes in my opinion. She gives the Legion another female with offensive powers, but also help to fill in some diversity into the Legion's ranks. She just needs a little more development with other characters and some positive exposure.
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