The Daily Review - Green Lantern #32
Up for Review:
writer: Geoff Johns
penciler: Ivan Reis
inker: Oclair Albert
I’m a massive Green Lantern fan. I’ve always liked all 4 of the Earth Green Lanterns. When Geoff Johns brought Hal back I was quite pleased. I wasn’t offended like the Kyle fans, or overjoyed like the hardcore Hal fans. I also thought the retcon was pulled off quite well. Some might disagree, like my friend Glen (atomicker) who will no doubt come on and say how much he hates Johns’ writing (Hi Glen!).
I’ve enjoyed most of Geoff Johns’ run on the title, and have been looking forward to the Blackest Night event. I just didn’t really see the point of Johns going back and doing Hal’s origin story again. I mean, we must have heard about it 20 times of the characters history! Now I am beginning to see why he did it though. Because of his introduction of Parallax, the Guardian’s Sector Mandate, the Prophesy of the Blackest Night etc. inconsistencies have been highlighted in the Origin, causing questions to be asked like why was Abin Sur in a ship, not flying with his ring? Why did Sinestro come out of his Sector to Earth? It turns out Abin Sur had been told of the prophesy, and lost faith in his ring. While transporting some beasty to Earth, it escaped, causing him to crash.
All the standard origin stuff is in here, but Johns is retconning the Hell out of it. As well as the Blackest Night stuff being tacked in (which he could have gotten away with), he changes the origin of Hactor Hammond. No longer is Hammond mutated by a meteor, but by the meteoric rock which powered Abin Sur’s craft. At the end of the book we see the monster Abin was transporting perform a ritual to show him the name of the agent of the Black Lantern (I assume, it is yet to be confirmed), who’s name is William Hand. William Hand is the original name of Black Hand.
Now, I don’t mind him making Black Hand the agent of the Black Lantern. In fact, it makes a certain kind of sense. I just don’t see why he had to go back and retcon the backstory again to fit that in, he has tied so many things together here it has just become sort of cheesy and obvious. Oh well, not long until the title goes back to the regular time line. I’m actually rather enjoying the main book.
Grade: 5 out of 10 - but I might come back and Retcon that score in a few years
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What? A Geoff Johns comic? Eat it, Gnasher! *grr, woof, gnash gnash* Good boy.
I knew you would reply to this one Gnasher?! What a blast from the past. Do you remember Gnipper too? I’m going to do an article about classic British comics at some point, you can be sure that the Beano will be featured
Sure I remember Gnipper! When I was a kid I had some relatives in the UK who would send me comics and whatnot in the mail — it’s how I got my introduction to 2000 AD as well as the Beano. It’s irritating we can’t get the Beano over here, though. I will look forward to your future article!
Actually, they sell it in chapters. It is about $5 I think. My broher-in-law bought one a while back. It looks really modernized, and made cool for the new generation though. It’s kind of sad when that happens, there were so many timeless classic strips in there.
What! I didn’t know that. I will check out Chapters next time I’m downtown… thanks for the tip!
I just realized we’ve spent this entire Geoff Johns/Green Lantern talkback section discussing the Beano. Too funny!
Well, the Beano IS better than this. Even though it is aimed at children