All Things From My Brain » green lantern

Review: Green Lantern-The Sinestro Corps War

Patrick Hester — Wed, 19 May 2010 16:30:40 +0000

So. Following reading Green Lantern: Rebirth, I wanted some more. It was nice to visit that universe again and the book itself, though a ‘complete story’ (beginning, middle and end), really did have that ‘jumping off point’ feel to it. They were intentionally setting up what was to come and drawing a line from which new people could hop on and old fans like me could dive back in. Really, it was the precursor to the whole ‘Blackest Night’ mega event crossover thing (which I came to hate when I was collecting comics).

Luckily for me, the sequel event/story was also available in trade paperback / graphic novel format, so I picked it up to check it out.

For those not in the know, Sinestro is the greatest enemy the Green Lantern has ever had. He was also their greatest member a long time ago.

The story goes that Sinestro was the greatest Green Lantern of all time; the Guardians on OA held him up as an example for all other Lanterns to follow and emulate. When the very first human from earth joined the corps, the Guardians decided that their greatest Lantern needed to be the one to train him, so they sent Sinestro to find and train Hal Jordan.

Jordan and he clashed from the get-go. Sinestro believed in his own brand of order and justice, so much so that he conquered his own homeworld, Korugar, and ruled there for years as a dictator. Eventually he was tried by the Guardians and sent to the antimatter universe where he allied himself with powerful beings there who forged a yellow power ring for him, yellow being the one color that a Green Lantern could not defend themself against due to an impurity built-into their power rings.

Throughout the years since, Sinestro fought and was defeated time and again by Hal Jordan and the Green Lanterns, so he was due a little retribution.

Enter: The Sinestro Corps War.

Paperback: 176 pages
Publisher: DC Comics (May 5, 2009)

The Sinestro Corps War is a trade paperback / graphic novel that compiles the events seen in Green Lantern 21-23, Green Lantern Corps 14-5 & the Green Lantern: Sinestro Corps Special all published by DC Comics.

If you haven’t read Green Lantern: Rebirth, you may want to stop reading this right now because there are spoilers going forward. In order to explain this books story, I have to give away that books secrets, which I avoided in my review.

So, you’ve been forewarned.

Go forward, get spoilers.

Okay?

Okay. So. The Green Lantern’s use power rings that are connected to a central battery on the planet OA, home to the Guardian’s. They created the battery, the lanterns that access it, the rings and the Corps. Originally, the Green Lantern Corps protected the universe sector by sector, one Lantern per sector. Today’s Corps uses pairs for each sector – so they’ve adopted the buddy system.

To use the power rings, one must have great willpower and little or no fear (or be able to conquer your fears). This is due to the yellow impurity within the rings energy, which is actually a living creature named Parallax. Parallax was able to infect Hal Jordan and do a ton of damage. A similar, willpower based creature also lived in the central core of the battery on OA, keeping Parallax in check at first and then, later, bonding with Kyle Rayner in much the same way as Parallax had infected Hal Jordan.

Thus, ION was born.

Kyle Rayner, once the ‘last’ Green Lantern, is now a beacon for the new Lantern Corps. When the story begins, we see Sinestro preparing something while Hal Jordan and the Justice League search for his whereabouts. Meanwhile, Ion comes across a yellow power ring making its way across the universe, then he realizes that it’s just one of many rings crisscrossing the universe in search of something.

Rayner captures a ring and then returns to OA where he finds the other Green Lantern’s from earth, Hal Jordan, John Stewart and Guy Gardner, all waiting for an audience with the Guardian’s. Suddenly the yellow ring, sensing Kyle’s despair over his mother’s recent death, goes crazy and captures him, transporting him to the antimatter universe and to the planet Qward where he encounters: The Sinestro Corps

Before the Green Lantern’s can mount a rescue, a coordinated attack happens all around the universe.

To their horror, the members of the Sinestro Corps, powered by yellow rings that the Lantern’s cannot defend against, begin killing Green Lantern’s all across the universe causing their rings to seek out new, worthy beings.

Back on Qward, Kyle Rayner is separated from the being that gives him his power as Ion and is instead infected by the creature known as Parallax.

The Green Lantern’s, lead by Hal Jordan, mount a rescue mission into the antimatter universe while the rest of the Corps, lead by Kilowog, try to counter attack the Sinestro Corps but their inability to fight off the yellow energy of Sinestro’s forces, coupled with the fact that the Sinestro Corps can actually kill where the Lantern’s cannot, means that they keep getting pushed further and further back.

Oddly, in the middle of all of this, Sinestro himself takes the time for a side trip to his home world, Korugar, where he confronts and defeats the current Green Lantern assigned to that sector, Soranik Natu. I say this is odd because it seems to kill the pacing of the book even though it’s a very Sinestro thing to do given that he used to rule that planet and the people there still fear him and any Green Lantern.

The Guardians decide that there is really only one solution if they don’t want to lose the war they didn’t even know was coming, one thing they can do to tip the scales and give their Lantern’s a fighting chance.

Lethal Force Has Been Enabled. Lantern’s all over the universe hear the same message coming from their rings. The gloves are off, the stakes set. War.

Having said all of that, I want to add – this is a much more disjointed story versus Green Lantern: Rebirth. I think that’s because this is the first act of a greater story (the whole ‘Blackest Night’ mega-crossover-extravaganza-lollapalooza-lillth-fair-ozzfest-icecapades-thingie). They had to cut it up to make it readable as a single volume and they did the best that they could, but, as with all of these massive mega-crossover events, there are too many threads to compress down. So, there’s a second volume to this that I don’t have yet and, of course, the whole ‘Blackest Night’ thing after that.

Because this is a disjointed story, it’s much harder to follow along versus Rebirth. I keep saying ‘disjointed’ even though, really, I mean – they put it all together in the order that it appeared, so I guess it’s not really disjointed, it just feels that way. Is that poor storytelling or do you really need to have all the subsequent volumes to see the whole picture and have it all make sense? Probably. But that’s the problem with the crossovers like this. I think they go too far, they try for too much and, in the end, they lose the reader because of it.

I’m a fan of Green Lantern and I enjoyed this book, but nowhere near as much as Rebirth. I think, if you’re not a fan, you’ll struggle with this one.

The Sinestro Corps War will run you $15 at your local store sans any discounts you might receive or you can find it online for around $10.

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Review: Green Lantern-Rebirth

Patrick Hester — Sat, 08 May 2010 22:32:56 +0000

October 1959; DC comics editor Julius Schwartz, writer John Broome and artist Gil Kane introduce a new, Silver Age version of a classic comic character to the world – The Green Lantern.

Gone is the magically powered Alan Scott (the Golden Age Green Lantern), replaced by a fighter/test pilot named Hal Jordan who is the first human being enlisted by an interstellar police force known as the ‘Green Lantern Corps’. Assigned to patrol sector 2814 by the Guardians on OA, Hal Jordan is a hero. That lasts until the 90’s when stuff starts to go wrong for old Hal. First he gives up the ring for Carol Ferris, his long time love, only to find out she’s been living a double life. He finds he way back to the ring and, after the Guardians disappear for a bit, forms a new Corps on earth with some friends. When that goes sour, he goes back to being just another GL until his home city is destroyed, the Guardians return and put him on trial and he decides he’s had it and becomes something new and different: Parallax.

As Parallax, Hal causes all sorts of trouble and becomes an enemy to just about everyone and everything. Insane, he tries to rewrite history and it takes all the heroes around to stop him and kill him. End of story, right?

Fraid not.

Hal’s spirit or soul becomes attached to or taken by The Spectre. Normally a ’spirit of vengeance’, the Spectre likes that Hal wants to make up for what he did as Parallax, so he/it decides to let Hal continue to try and redeem himself, which eventually leads to why we’re all here:

Green Lantern: Rebirth.

Rebirth is a trade paperback / graphic novel that brings together the 5 issue mini-series by Geoff Johns, Ethan Van Sciver & Prentis Rollins.

Paperback: 176 pages
Publisher: DC Comics; Trade Paper edition (March 28, 2007)

Keep in mind that I haven’t picked up a GL comic since Kyle Rayner took over in the 90’s. Rayner is not a favorite of mine at all, as I’ve mentioned before, and really all of his stuff came after I stopped with the comics on account I needed to pay my bills and my comic book habit was interfering with that. So, when I decided to pick up ‘Rebirth’, I wasn’t sure what to expect. I knew the stuff above; that Jordan had gone nuts, that he’d died then come back, but didn’t know about the Spectre thing or that John Stewart was still running around with a ring. Didn’t even know that Guy Gardner no longer had a ring and was, instead, some sort of ‘warrior’.

So no matter what happened, I had high hopes for something entertaining. Sort of like seeing an old friend again after a long absence. I wasn’t disappointed.

You can’t keep a good comic book character down

Comic book characters, like The Master from Doctor Who, just won’t stay dead no matter how many times or how many different ways you kill em. That includes Hal Jordan.

A lot of times in comics, a ‘reboot’ of a character means they are either going to toss out the old mythology that you knew and loved in favor of a ‘new and reimagined’ version (Man of Steel, Ultimate Spider-Man). With Green Lantern, they sort of already did that with Emerald Dawn 1 and 2. A lot has happened since then so I was very happy to see that they weren’t just going to start over, they instead gave us a true ‘rebirth’ of the characters and the mythology but kept what we already knew, loved and in some cases, hated.

The first thing we see is Kyle Rayner doing his job, protecting the universe. Not just his sector, all the sectors. He is the only active Green Lantern left so it’s his job to protect everyone and everything. Tough gig.

Then he gets a translated message from some locals on the very edge of the universe itself that makes him go, “Huh?!”

Yikes, right?! I mean, that’s Hal Jordan! He was Parallax!

So now we see what old Hal is up to; he’s Hal, but he’s also The Spectre and there’s still a little bit of Parallax in there thrown in for good measure. Kinda crowded in his head, really.

The first dozen or more pages are a walk down memory lane and a treat for those of us who’ve been around and reading forever. We get to see the characters we’ve known while the new reader gets introductions and brief backstories. We even get to see an Abin Sur-like crash landing to kick things off (Kyle crashing home to earth).

The little jaunt down memory lane reintroduces (or introduces, depending on your knowledge of the mythology) us to Hal Jordan, Kyle Rayner, John Stewart, Guy Gardner, Carol Ferris, The Green Arrow (one of my absolute favorites), the Green Lantern Corps, The Spectre &, of course, Parallax. If you aren’t familiar with the last ten years of mythology (like me), it’s a great quick and concise catch up that sets the foundation for the story.

We see that Hal still struggles with what he did as Parallax, that The Spectre isn’t content to just be a spirit of ‘redemption’ (he throws in some vengeance whenever he can), and that something bad is coming and coming soon.

The first clue is the message to Kyle Rayner, the second is when Guy Gardner’s new powers explode, the third when Coast City, Hal’s home town that was destroyed by Mongul after Superman’s death, suddenly reappears sans any people (something Hal tried to do but got blocked by the Guardians which lead to the whole Parallax thing in the first place).

Cameo’s from the Justice League show us that whatever’s afoot, Batman for one, is ready to blame Hal who, he says, “Always had an EGO. He never worried when things came crashing down. He never prepared. He just flew in. Damn the consequences. We should’ve known back then a man like him couldn’t be trusted.” This leads to one of the best moments in the book for me – John Stewart versus Batman that culminates in the following statement:

Brilliant. That sums up the Dark Knight so well.

Meanwhile, we’re taking a walk down memory lane with Hal and Carol who’re remembering their past together. Hal doesn’t seem to have any idea that anything weird is going on or that the Justice League is coming for him until they’re right on top of him. At this point, John Stewart goes nuts and starts attacking people. At this same moment, Hal Jordan’s old ring, now in the care of Green Arrow, activates and duplicate’s itself (which I didn’t know it could do!) and Guy Gardner’s condition changes and he becomes a Green Lantern again.

When John goes nuts and starts attacking the JLA, Hal tries to help but the Spectre says ‘no’ and takes him away for a chat where we learn the origins of Parallax (the ‘real’ origins). I won’t ruin it for you.

We also learn that the big bad has returned and who is the biggest & baddest for the Green Lanterns? Why, their greatest member, fallen into disgrace, of course. Sinestro:

As an aside, can I just say – I love Green Arrow. I love the smart-ass mouth, the attitude, the whole package.

I made a mistake when I bought this book; I thought they were resurrecting Hal Jordan which, really, they did – but that wasn’t the only goal here. See, they were very smart and very cool and they really resurrected The Green Lantern; the Corps, the Guardians, the Enemies, the Mythos – and it’s fantastic.

You start to think that it’s going to be a JLA story (what with all the cameos), and for a while, as Parallax returns, it’s the JLA who hold him back. But as Hal gets his ring on again, we see that it’s not about the JLA or Hal Jordan, but about the Green Lantern’s as a whole. Oh, and he has it out with Batman which is priceless. Don’t get me wrong, I love Bats, I do, but there aren’t enough people who just tell him to fuck off every once in a while.

He really should’ve seen that coming…

After this, the Corps gets the band back together to take care of business.

I’m being intentionally vague on these bits because I don’t want to be all spoilery on you. But here’s a clue:

Overall, Green Lantern: Rebirth is a very entertaining book full of stuff for the long time fan but is also a nice starting point for someone just picking it up. GL has always been full of scifi goodness and has a special place in my heart. It’ll run you $18 (cover price sans any discounts you might have) at a brick and mortar store but you can find it online for $10 and it’s well worth your time and money. The art and writing are fantastic but you won’t be able to read this one alone, oh no – you’ll find yourself wanting more…

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Review: Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths

Patrick Hester — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 19:10:06 +0000

I’ve been a fan of the DC animated films for quite some time now, so when I heard about their latest, Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths, I couldn’t wait for it to come out – which was yesterday! (Tuesday, Feb 23rd)

My new house has no BestBuy conveniently sitiated (pronounced sitch-ee-ated) nearby (I buy most of my DVD’s at BestBuy. We have a hate/hate relationship, but I still shop there because you love the one you hate or you hate the one you love or some such…). There IS a BestBuy nearish work, so I headed over at lunch and picked up the 2-disc, digital copy set. I’ve bought these before and it’s worked well – I get a DVD copy for the big tv and an iTunes digital copy for the computer.

This time around, it didn’t work so well. When I followed the instructions to dl my digital copy, I found myself at a Warner Brothers website informing me that the digital copy was Windows only.

BOOOOOO! BOOOOOOO WARNER BROTHERS! BAD WARNER BROTHERS!! BAD! *rolled up newspaper to the nose*

…anyway, about the movie.

Loved it.

Let me see if I can tell you about it without spoiling it.

ENGAGE COMIC BOOK NERD BRAIN FOR BACKSTORY!

The DC Universe has a lot of characters in it. Way back when, they started rebooting popular characters from the Golden Age – like Flash, Green Lantern, etc. Eventually, this caught up to them and they needed a house cleaning because they had so many different versions of what was essentially the same hero spanning 50 years of publishing. Enter Crisis on Infinite Earths. Drilling down that story – they used 12 issues of what they called a ‘maxi-series’, to clean up their universe. They explained that there were multiple earths, each with its own history, its own stories and superheroes (The Multiverse). They introduced the concept of an ‘Earth Prime’ from which all other earths sprang, so to speak.

"Somewhere in here is what I like to call 'Earth Prime'."

Crisis on Two Earths plays on this by introducing an earth where the Justice League is lead by none other than Lex Luther, and where that Justice League has been beaten by a super powered criminal empire known as the Crime Syndicate. the Syndicate is made up of mirror universe versions of the heroes we know; Flash, Superman, Wonder Woman, Batman, Green Lantern and the Martian Manhunter – Johnny Quick, Ultraman, Superwoman, Owlman, Power Ring and they don’t really name him so I guess he’s just the Martian Manhunter on both sides which is kinda lame cuz, I mean, heck – you came up with all these new names for the mirror universe versions of the other people so you couldn’t spend maybe a half an hour coming up with the ‘Saturn Kid’ or some such nonsense? Really?

The Justice League

The Crime Syndicate

Like any good movie featuring any sort of faithful version of Batman, he’s an asshole. So is Owlman. Also, just like any sort of Justice League movie, Green Lantern is a throw away character and hardly has anything to do, which is sad. I suppose they justify this (PUN!) by saying they did that whole ‘First Flight’ movie. Whatever – I say, GIVE HAL JORDAN MORE SCREEN TIME, DAMMIT!

Main plot is simple: Luthor crosses over, asks for help, Justice League sans Batman (cuz he’s an ASSHOLE PEOPLE) goes to help. Mischief ensues, bad guys cross back over forcing Batman to get involved (which just pisses him off because he really wanted to just hang out in his new satellite, turn the lights off and brood. Quietly. Maybe torture himself with some photos of his parents or some Yanni.) and leads to MY FAVORITE PART OF THE MOVIE:

"GET AWAY FROM HER YOU BITCH!"

…wait, I’m getting my movies mixed up. What was I thinking about? Oh! Yeah! I got it:

"You're on my property. Stand down."

Yeah. That’s more like it. What’s that, Bats? Something more to say?

Sounds like ‘Bring it’ to me!

Anyway, more mischief, Batman has to crossover now, silly sub plot with Martian Manhunter, we get to see a red version of Green Arrow, etc and so on and I won’t spoil the ending for you.

Overall, I really enjoyed it. Gina Torres as Superwoman and James Woods as Owlman absolutely steal the show. I loved their voices. Not so fond of Mark Harmon & William Baldwin as Superman and Batman respectively. Previous actors have simply made their marks on these iconic characters and you really have to step up if you want to play in their sandboxes which, sadly, neither of these actors achieved.

Bonus Review: Showcase: The Spectre

Having said all of that, the absolute delight of the DVD has to be the special Showcase: The Spectre short film. Oh. My. God. Loved it. Absolutely friggin loved it. If they’re trying to get interest to make a show or a full length movie, baby I am on board and ready to go! Sign me up!

If you don’t know the character, The Spectre is the ghost of Jim Corrigan, a police detective who was murdered. When he died, his spirit was refused entry into the afterlife. As a spirit, he was assigned the duty to find justice for those in need of it and to eliminate evil. He does this as The Spectre.

Similar to the Ghost Rider except without the motorcycle and the fireball head and all the demon stuff.

For the short film, they went with a retro 70’s look and feel and it just fit the material so well. Corrigan is on the trail of the people who killed his galpal’s dad, and The Spectre is looking to dole out some justice. 70’s style.

*cue cheesy music*

Again, I don’t want to spoil it for you but I will say that it felt like a taste of something that could be, a quick little peak (sort of like a pilot episode) into this character and what he’s all about. Voiced by the fantastic Gary Cole (the Nighthawk!), I felt he really brought the character to life. What a wonderful addition this was to the disc!

Jim Corrigan

"I am Vengeance. I am The Spectre!"

"In the land beyond the living, all things are possible."

So – check it out if you have the funds available, I bought the 2 disc, regular DVD (I don’t have BluRay) version for $20 at BestBuy. Well worth your time if you enjoy comics and, specifically, the Justice League. If you are a Marvel fan over all I will say this – the DC animated features have just been better. I’ve watched the Ultimate Avengers pieces and the Hulk Vs and I think the DC stuff has just told the stories better and done the animation better. Give it a shot – you may like it.

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Emerald Dawn II

Patrick Hester — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 18:30:51 +0000

This is the last of my Green Lantern posts for a bit. I’ve told you all about Hal Jordan, John Stewart, Guy Gardner and Alan Scott – have mentioned Kyle Rayner, but not much cuz he was after me for the most part.

But what I want to talk about today is the second reboot of The Green Lantern.

The first reboot happened when the Silver Age version, Hal Jordan, was born. The second reboot happened after the Crisis on Infinite Earths in a story called ‘Emerald Dawn’. I never had any of those comics, but I do have it’s sequel, ‘Emerald Dawn II’.

Emerald Dawn was similar to The Man of Steel series that retold the origins of Superman – it detailed how Hal Jordan came to be The Green Lantern. The sequel told the same basic story as Green Lantern: First Flight – Hal Jordan being trained by Sinestro.

Part of the reason for the retellings of the heroes from the DC universe was to create new canon following the Crisis books. It also provides a new, fresh look at the characters for newbies entering the comic book stores and us old farts who’ve been around for a while.

I’m not against them per se, especially when done well (I liked Man of Steel, the Aquaman reboot, Flash Gordon) and these were done well. It gave you an all new reason to respect and like Hal, and helped to understand where Sinestro came from, why he hates the Corps, Guardians and Hal Jordan so much – overall, a really nice mini-series.

The Green Lantern is a favorite of mine – I love the concept, love the universe they live in. When they rebooted the series for the Silver Age, they took the ideas of the time; space travel, flight/fighter planes/test pilots & aliens and they swirled them up into a fantastic adventure that stands the test of time better than most.

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The Original Green Lantern

Patrick Hester — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 18:30:17 +0000

Before Hal Jordan or John Stewart, Guy Gardner and Kyle Rayner came along, there was another Green Lantern. The Original.

Born in the ‘Golden Age of Comics’ (1930’s-1940’s), this Green Lantern was more magical than SciFi. His name was Alan Scott.

Alan’s story is different. Created in the late 30’s/early 40’s by Martin Nodell, The Green Lantern’s power was magic, not gifted science from the Guardians on OA. His power came from a ‘green flaming rock’ that fell to the earth thousands of years ago. Scott finds a lantern (the rock/flame had been smithed/formed or something into the shape of a lantern) and it tells him how he can make a ring that will give him great power when combined with the lantern – which he does. Thus, The Green Lantern is born.

But he is not without weakness. Unlike the vulnerability to the color yellow built into the Green Lantern Corps by the Guardians of OA, Alan’s ring is vulnerable to wood. Kinda weird, I know – but hey! Every superhero needs to have his kryptonite – am I right?

Being the first Green Lantern wasn’t enough for Scott – he also had to be a founding member of the world’s very first super-group (and no, it wasn’t The Beatles). It was the Justice Society of America:

The JSA fought together for a long time. When DC decided to create new, updated versions of their venerable characters, it was decided that there was actually a multi-verse in the DCU – multiple earths where different versions of Green Lantern, Flash, Hawkman, etc., existed. This meant they could still keep the old characters with their story-lines intact, but also have updated versions to play with.

Of course, this sort of blew up in their face later on. It was a little confusing. You had a Green Lantern who wore a cape, had nothing to do with the Guardians, was vulnerable to wood and who had kids:

Jade and Obsidian, children of Alan Scott

Not to mention three or four versions of The Flash (Jay Garrick, Barry Allen, Wally West, Bart Allen), a couple versions of SuperGirl, story-lines crossing over from universe to universe – it was a bit of a mess, really.

DC’s solution was a massive event called ‘Crisis on Infinite Earths’. This was an attempt to bring everything together into one ‘earth’, one continuity, throwing out the stuff that they didn’t like and allowing for fresh restarts of things that needed it. Yes people, this was the very first -reboot-. In this case, a reboot of an entire universe, touching every book and character in the DC playbook.

How did this effect Alan Scott?

He got to be the hero and save the entire multiverse.

Crisis created as many problems as it fixed, and one of them was the question, “What the heck do we do with the JSA?” Ragnarok was the answer.

They were tagged to fight Ragnarok. Forever. Locked away in Asgard, only a few – their loved ones, remembered them. I was a heavy reader of Infinity Inc. at the time, and the kids (Infinity Inc. was the ‘children and heirs’ of the JSA) were really torn apart by the whole thing.

But, you can’t keep a good superhero team down, and the JSA returned in the early 90’s with a 6 issue mini that I really liked.

Those nasty little problems were still hanging out there though – the ones related to the whole continuity of the DCU. For Scott, they revealed that the ‘green flame’ that fell to earth so long ago had actually been a GL fallen from grace. It also predated the inclusion of the yellow vulnerability of the Guardians and was outside the normal GL corps network. This allowed him to be a GL but not be part of the corps. The OAns knew about him, though, and had decided long ago that he was doing ‘good’ so they left him be.

Corny, I know – but hey, it seemed to fit so the stuck with it for a while.

For me, Scott was a favorite of the Green Lanterns. I also liked his kids and their spin-off comic, Infinity Inc. The Justice Society of America is also my favorite team. Every team that has come since, has been based on what they did first.

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The Green Lantern-Guy Gardner

Patrick Hester — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 19:30:55 +0000

The Green Lantern: Guy Gardner

When the Green Lantern of sector 2814 lay dying on the planet Earth, he asked his ring to seek out a worthy successor to pass the ring onto. To his astonishment, the ring found not one, but two worthy beings on the planet. He had to decide between them. He chose Hal Jordan.

The other one was named Guy Gardner.

When he found out that there had been a fifty percent chance of him NOT being the Green Lantern, Hal Jordan made a point of getting to know the other guy. They ended up becoming friends and, whenever Hal needed someone to fill in for him, he picked Guy. It was a nice thing to do, I suppose. Noble.

Unfortunately for Guy, he had some bad luck. He was hit by a bus and trapped in the phantom zone when his battery exploded. He was rescued, but the damage was done and he ended up in a coma, where he stayed for a really long time.

When the Guardians were divided on how to deal with the massive, multi issue Crisis event, a splinter group revived Guy and gave him a ring similar to Alan Scott’s (not tied to the main battery on OA) and started giving him missions.

Gone was the decent Guy though – the accidents, the time in the phantom zone, even the coma – they had all taken their toll. Guy was now an ahole to the extreme. And he really, really, really didn’t like Hal Jordan anymore.

…the feeling was mutual.

Guy Gardner – not a favorite of mine over all. Just such an ahole.

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The Green Lantern-John Stewart

Patrick Hester — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 19:30:25 +0000

The Green Lantern: John Stewart

One day, the Green Lantern for sector 2814 flew to the planet OA, home of the blue skinned, telepathic Guardians, and quit. His name was Hal Jordan. His long time girlfriend, Carol Ferris, had demanded that he choose: the ring, or her. He chose her.

This left a vacuum that needed to be filled. The Guardians could have picked anyone from sector 2814, anyone who was worthy. In the end, they chose a guy from Earth named John Stewart.

John Stewart had been around for a very long time. Early in his career, Hal Jordan found out that he had a fifty fifty chance of becoming the Green Lantern. There was another person who was just as worthy as he was, a man named Guy Gardner. When he learned about Gardner, he made a point of getting to know him and even arranging for Guy to be his backup and take his place protecting his sector whenever he was unable to do so himself.

When Guy was hurt, the Guardians found a new backup for Jordan – John Stewart. And when Hal quit the corps, the Guardians decided to go with an experienced replacement rather than train someone outright – they picked Stewart.

When he became a full fledged Green Lantern, the Guardians assigned Katma Tui to train him. From the planet Korugar, the red-skinned alien was one of my favorite characters in the whole GL universe. I really liked her style. John did too – he ended up engaged to marry her. Would’ve have, too, if Hal Jordan’s former main squeeze turned psycho super villain, Carol Ferris / Star Sapphire hadn’t killed her.

Stewart himself has never been a favorite of mine. I liked that he decided to go without a mask early on:

But other than that, I didn’t care much for him. It could’ve been that I just missed Hal Jordan or felt some sort of loyalty to him or something – I don’t know. But even after the series became The Green Lantern Corps, and Stewart had his own spin off in Mosaic and then the whole thing was rebooted as ‘Green Lantern’ again, I still didn’t care much for him.

I stopped collecting Green Lantern before Jordan went all crazy super villain and Stewart went all loopy/sappy pining for a dead Katma, which I’m glad for.

I will say this: the animated series Justice League from Cartoon Network elevated my respect for John Stewart quite a bit. I ended up really liking that version of the character.

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Comic Nostalgia – The Green Lantern

Patrick Hester — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 18:30:07 +0000

When I think of the Green Lantern, I think of the Silver Age Lantern – Hal Jordan. (I am fully aware of Alan Scott, though)

Hal Jordan was a test pilot for Ferris Aircraft. One day, he was enveloped in a green light and whisked away to the middle of nowhere. He found a spaceship with a dying alien inside. His name was Abin Sur.

Sur was a Green Lantern, the Green Lantern for sector 2814 and he was dying. He needed to find a successor, someone worthy, so he asked his ring to choose from the planet he was on. The ring chose Jordan.

The Green Lantern Corps was/is a galactic police force created by the Guardians, a race of telepathic beings who live on the planet OA. They choose beings who are ‘worthy’ to wear the power rings that they can control using their willpower. With these rings, they patrol sectors of the galaxy, keeping the peace.

Here’s the first Green Lantern comic I bought:

Green Lantern #175

I don’t remember why I bought this, but I did. This started me down the Green Lantern adventure.

I liked Hal Jordan a lot. I liked that he wasn’t perfect – he had a lot of troubles with his life; like the fact that his girlfriend (and boss) Carol Ferris knew he was a superhero and wasn’t happy with it because it kept taking him away from earth.

After all, being a Green Lantern means you are part of the big picture. By definition, his job was to patrol a sector of space, not one single planet. This caused friction.

In the cover above, Carol is basically saying ‘Me or the ring – pick one!’

See, there was this mysterious guy out to destroy Ferris aircraft, a real super bad. When he did a ton of damage, Hal was on another planet and thus, unable to help or stop the attack and damage. Carol was pissed.

Believe it or not, Hal did give up the ring. He was tired of it all, tired of having to choose between his life and his job. After a lot of soul searching and some advice seeking from crossover heroes like Superman, Flash and Green Arrow, he went to OA and quit.

This turned out to be a bad thing to do. See, the bad guy terrorizing Carol Ferris? It was the ultimate split personality – and when they got back together, they reformed and Star Sapphire was reborn:

So now, Jordan was a normal guy because he thought he was gonna do the happy after with his main squeeze, only to find out that she was subconsciously plotting against him and wanted him to give up the ring so she could have some revenge against him.

Through one of those long and convoluted stories (but not a massive crossover event, THANK GOD!), Hal ends up back on OA and manages to get a ring again so he can kick some butt.

This actually was the END of Green Lantern as a series. See, OA was attacked, people were killed, the corp and the Guardians devastated.

Thus was born: The Green Lantern Corps…

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Trolling my comics-Box 2 Part 2

Patrick Hester — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 00:37:26 +0000

The particulars in case you forgot: I’m trolling through my comic book collection, which spans 1977-1995/6ish, because I’m feeling nostalgic and want to share. I invite you to tag along with me cuz I hope it’ll be fun – I’m even taking pics of the covers with my iPhone (sorry about the quality there but honestly – who wants to go through and scan all these things?!) so you can see what I see. I’m also telling stories, which is always fun.

And since I’m grabbing boxes at random, we never know what we’re gonna get until we get it. Got it? Good – let’s move on then people! Oh – and you can always click on the images for a bigger photo.

Box #2 part 2 – Green Everything

If there are any two heroes in my collection that I could not have lived without, Spider-Man would be the first, Green Lantern would be the second.

I don’t know what it is about Hal Jordan that appealed to me so much as a kid; maybe it was the test pilot thing, maybe it was the hot girl friend, maybe it was the fact that, at any time he wanted, he could just fly off to another world and kick some butt.

We may never truly know.

The Green Lantern went through a lot of changes on my watch; first Hal Jordan retired (which turned out to be a horrible thing to do) and John Stewert took over for him. Then Hal came back and the remnants of the Green Lantern Corps settled on Earth for a time. Then all hell broke lose again.

Whatever happens, Hal Jordan will be my Green Lantern – s’why I was so thrilled with the recent animated movie. I have no memory whatsoever of this ‘Emerald Dawn’ business, but I’m sure it was a pain in the ass crossover event that forced me to buy friggin Booster Gold or some such shit just to get the ‘complete’ story.

…not that I’m bitter or anything. More on crossover madness later. Promise.

As THRILLED as I was to find some Green Lantern in this box (you people probably think I am really, really unorganized not to know what’s in these boxes. You aren’t wrong. Aren’t totally right either…), I was overjoyed to find a couple of books featuring Ollie in them.

Oliver Queen – The Green Arrow. Robin Hood for a modern age.

Forget the Smallville bs – this is Oliver Queen in all his glory. I like a little attitude I my heroes, a little sass, a little…villain. And let’s not forget the swashbuckling. Gotta have that.

Which is exactly what Green Arrow delivered and then some.

I have said it many times before and I will say it many times again: Marvel is for kids, DC is for adults. Or young adults at the least. Green Arrow has some pretty gritty story’s over the years, but he also had plenty of buddy ‘movies’ with Green Lantern. And I liked him so much better than Hawkeye, Marvels’ version of an archer. He was just a better character and a better book.

Loved this series.

Another character from the DC universe that I never really knew a lot about was the Martian Manhunter. He’s a Martian. And he’s a Manhunter. Okay…

So, lucky for me, this series came out called ‘Martian Manhunter: American Secrets’ and it shed a little light on the character and made me like him. Dammit.

“He reached for me as the bullet broke his breastbone. Who else could he reach for? He’s a stranger. I’m a stranger. Not just strangers to each other, but even bigger strangers in the cold stone eyes of the city. He’s a beatnik. I’m a Martian.”

1959 America. the cold war is heating up and commie fever is sweeping America. It’s not a good time to have secrets, nor to keep them. So it sucks to be John Jones who’s posing as a police detective but really comes from mars.

WHO WRITES THIS STUFF? IT SOUNDS CORNY AND YET I WANNA READ IT NOW DON’T YOU?!

This series was fantastic. It taught me about the Manhunter, who he was and what he was about plus it was just a damned fine story (I just decided to re-read it btw). The books themselves were in the high end format – stiff card stock for the covers, nicer paper stock for the inside. Artwork is just amazing. Really well done.

Now I’m gonna leave you with a few more random covers from this box.

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Podcast: Episode 7

Patrick Hester — Sun, 02 Aug 2009 23:03:42 +0000

Episode #7: All Things from My Brain

In the seventh episode of the All Things From My Brain podcast, I talk about the Kindle once again and the lawsuit against Amazon, about Firefox passing one billion downloads, Apple’s new 3.0.1 update to fix an SMS exploit on the iPhone, the buzz around the iTablet from Apple, Torchwood: Children of the earth, Green Lantern First flight, the San Diego Comic Con, J Michael Stracynski and his advice to writers, my own writing and what’s been happening over on the blog.

[podcast]http://www.atfmb.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/AllThingsFromMyBrain007.mp3[/podcast]

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