Green Lantern: May 2009 Archives

DC Comics Final Night mini-series was published in 1996--which killed off Hal Jordan (as Parallax) in the concluding chapter.  As we all know, Hal Jordan never left the DC Universe, he was always around as the Spectre until Green Lantern: Rebirth.  As a memorial tribute to the hero they maligned, DC published a special "Green Lantern Gallery", loaded with pin-ups of the Silver Age Green Lantern.  This cover jam was a real treat, featuring three generations of Green Lanterns, drawn by the artists who created them!  Gil Kane on Hal Jordan, Marty Nodell on Alan Scott, and Daryl Banks on Kyle Rayner.  All of them topped off with inks by the great Kevin Nowlan.  What a cover, whoever owns this one is very lucky!  Nuff said.

This cover was for the special "Silver Age" mini-event in 2000.  I saved this image of the cover, sans the logo and captions, from one of the DC solicitations.  Kevin Nowlan inked this cover and many other jobs that Kane worked on during this period.  I really like the color scheme in this version--Sinestro in a blue haze raining down trouble on Hal Jordan, which the green circles focus your attention on.

Apparently someone at DC Comics did not like that color scheme.  Here's the actual published cover.  Perhaps the editorial change was to restore Sinestro's purplish skin color as it appears in the interiors.  However, they made a mistake with this new color scheme--Sinestro's ring is emitting green energy, not yellow!  Nuff said.

I saw Nathan Fillion twitter about the Green Lantern trailer that a fan named Jaron Pitts posted on YouTube a couple of days ago.  Pitts stitched together scenes from various movies and TV shows.

Awesome.  The trailer really captures the richness of the Green Lantern mythology.  It picks up on the key story beats that have to be in any GL origin: Abin Sur, Hal being chosen for the ring, OA, the Guardians, the giant power battery, the inter-galactic members of the GL corps (Kilowogg, Chip), and the GL oath.

Wonder if WB will use any ideas for their Green Lantern trailer?  Making the WB logo green seems like a no-brainer.  Jaron lives in Dallas and has made other fan videos.  This one must have taken a lot of effort to put together.  Nuff said.

Update: Popdose has an interview with Jaron Pitts about the making of the GL video.

Blackest Night #0 was released today for Free Comic Book Day.  It's a decent story with above average art by Ivan Reis.  Mostly it's a way for Geoff Johns to introduce new readers to the recent events of the DC Universe.  He reminds people that recently Batman has "died", although we all know he's just stuck in the past.  But Aquaman, Elongated Man, and Martian Manhunter have all perished over the past few years, as well as the original Firestorm, Ronnie Raymond.  (The Aquaman reference is telling you to completely forget about that panel in Final Crisis #7.)  Johns is setting it up so that these characters will be revived as Black Lanterns.  Along with, we assume, the original Earth-1 Superman!

It's strange to see both Barry Allen and Hal Jordan discuss their deaths in this issue.  Hal says to Barry, "I died a sinner.  You died a saint".  Yet, here they are, back from the dead! 

And they are not the only DC heroes to journey back.  Oliver Queen came back to life as Green Arrow when Kevin Smith re-launched that title years ago.  In the 80s-90s, we pretty much had a generational shift as Hal, Barry, and Oliver died and turned over their mantles to Kyle Rayner, Wally West, and Connor Hawke.  That was exciting and a bit revolutionary at that time--something that differentiated DC Comics from Marvel.  Certain creators really loved the new generation.  Grant Morrison mentioned that he loved writing Kyle Rayner as he was more fallible than Hal Jordan.  Mark Waid proved that Wally West could be even more interesting that Barry Allen.

Now all of that has been undone.  And with it, the concept of death.  No character can completely die now in the DC Universe.  Just look at Legion of Three Worlds #4.  Kid Flash has returned, which is OK in my book, as everything was kind of telegraphed way in advance.  But now they've also brought back Connor Kent (Superboy), which just completely negates his big sacrifice at the conclusion of Infinite Crisis.

Oh well, let's bring back everybody!  I'm guessing that Johns will revive at least one dead member of the DC Universe permanently by the conclusion of Blackest Night.  I'll wager that either Aquaman and/or Martian Manhunter will cross back over into the land of the living.  Nuff said.