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Green Lanterns 1

By Andy Doan
June 18, 2016 - 11:11

Green Lanterns 1

This is the second title of DC’s rebirth that I read the first being Batman. Although I did enjoy Batman I have to say this new GL offering blows it out of the water in almost every category.

This will not be an in depth review. The book is out now and I advise anyone with interest in Green Lantern to go and pick it up. I just want to take some time to talk about what is right about this book and why it’s one of the best DC titles at the moment.

The two new lanterns are cool. Simon Biaz is from the economic wasteland of America. He’s being threatened with charges of terrorism because of his ethnicity. Told to hand over the ring or Amanda Waller will come after his family. Bow to the imperial overlords or hand over the greatest weapon in the universe? His response paraphrased Charlton Heston’s famous line “...from my cold dead hands!” In this book we see him use a car battery as one of his constructs. That’s who he is, it’s what comes out of his subconscious in the heat of battle.

Jessica Cruz is another modern classical character. She is filled with self doubt, agoraphobic, maybe a little anxious. She’s a person who doesn’t really recognize her own potential. Is it intentional that her internal dialogue is lettered in yellow to show a fear impurity? Did they do that?  She takes on the challenge of the ring to help protect people.

The bad guys in this story line end up being the Red Lantern Corps but we get there in a very interesting way. Someone who creates hell on earth in their little dirty house on the edge of the bad part of town. A person promised a special place of power from an unworldly source. Marginalized citizens go missing and the police could care less about the complaints of their loved ones. Now the site of the mass murder is exposed the victims families converge in a riot of frustration that quickly turns to anger in the view of their senseless pain. On that spot the Hell Tower springs up from the ground. These days this type of thing is happening all the time it seems like. We don’t have Atrocitus to blame but luckily we have the green light of hope to save us. 

So far we haven’t been treated to the common scenes of dozens of lanterns of various colors doing battle in space where one or two b-role GLs get killed every story arc. I really hope they are able to keep it very small so we can focus on the two main characters and how they deal with an enemy as large as humankind. I do love the space stuff but I am very interested in seeing how the cosmic powers deal with a universal planet-side threat.

Needless to say I am all in on this series. Bring on the Red Dawn!

Green Lantern 1

Last Updated: August 31, 2023 - 08:12