Blackest Night #7 Review

What a difference a day makes! Blackest Night #7 was released today and it's a doozy! Now there are things that I'm sure that some fans will not be pleased with. I, on the other hand, found it all made sense even though it's not necessarily what I wanted to see happen. But the reality is that the emotional spectrum pretty much predicates that what takes place in this issue is the only thing that could have happened.

I'm also really happy that I was at least exactly right on one of my pieces of speculation from yesterday, and pretty darn close with the Guardian's great lie. So, without further adieu, here's my review of Blackest Night #7, and it's not spoiler free.

Nekron continues his battle at Coast City, posing the question to a Guardian about why they guard the universe, to which the Guardian replies, "I do not remember".  The rings of the New Guardians still have no effect on Nekron himself and Black Hand finally enters the fray for real.  

Johns reminds us that Atrocitus and Black Hand have met before, when Abin Sur crashed on Earth, which is important because the missing piece to the puzzle of the death of Abin Sur is the reason why he came to Earth.  What was it that he was looking for.  By the end of the issue we'll have the answer to that puzzle that exonerates Hal's predecessor.

While Hal is dealing with Black Hand, the problem of giving a power ring to the likes of Lex Luthor and Scarecrow becomes evident and the influence of their respective power source drive them to become more of a liability than an asset.  Luthor's avarice knows no bounds and when he decides that he wants all the rings he causes more problems for the New Guardians that they can handle.

Meanwhile John and the Black Lanterns from Xanshi battle high above Coast City and Airwave prevents John from communication with his compatriots just as all the Corps arrive on Earth, effectively bringing the Green Lantern Corps title fully into the main story after the Indigo Tribe teleported them all from Oa at the end of Green Lantern Corps #45.  Ivan Reis once again out does himself with a great two pager:

Guy Gardner and company arrive on Earth.

While all the corps fight, we get a glimpse that something is inside the Black Lantern Power Battery; that something being the Anti-Monitor, who's defeat at the end of the Sinestro Corps War led to the infamous teaser for Blackest Night.  It's then that the revelations of the story begin to make themselves known as Black Hand kills a Guardian and places his heart at the center of an emblem that has formed on the ground - the symbol of the Brightest Day that DC revealed a few weeks ago.

Coast City's most elusive citizen.

Ganthet tells Hal that Nekron is making contact, but does not elaborate with whom.  Nekron then says "Trespasser....Rise" and bursting from beneath Coast City is an entity bursting with white light.  Nekron's assault on the being causes pain to every living being.  Then we bear witness to Ganthet's revelation.

While the Guardians may be the oldest living beings in the universe, life began on Earth.  Not far from what I was guessing.  This makes so much sense - it explains several things from the Guardian's reluctance to involve humans in the Corps, what Abin Sur was looking for, and why, once they let one human in the GLC, they added many to try to protect their secret.  So important is this to the security of our universe that the Guardians allowed Abin Sur to loose face with the Corps and cast him in a bad light to discredit his belief in the prophecy he was told back in the "Tygers" story by Alan Moore.

The presence of the white entity also means that it probably has nothing to do with the disappearance of the Parallax entity in Green Lantern #51 as I speculated, so somewhere out there Ion, Parallax and Predator are embroiled in events with some unknown being that I'm sure will be revealed to us in the issues to follow.  If anything, I'm pleased that Geoff continues to lay groundwork for the future even in the middle of an event like this.

As the entity lay there defenseless, Hal realizes that someone must act as the host for it and he flies to embrace his destiny as the greatest lantern of them all.  But before he can, the one guy I thought might rise to the occasion does and Sinestro stops Hal long enough to get there first.  And the issue ends with a two page splash of Sinestro bathed in blinding light wearing the uniform of the White Lantern and proclaiming "I am the greatest lantern of them ALL!"

Nekron's worst nightmare.

The color work this issue was exceptional.  Alex Sinclair has done a great job throughout this miniseries and I feel bad for not mentioning it before.  It would be so easy for an event like this to look pretty ugly with all the different colors of the spectrum represented in the wardrobes of the characters and the their various energy signatures and constructs.  But not once throughout the Blackest Night have I felt like it was starting to go too far and that's a credit to the whole art team.

There's also another great macabre tale from "The Book of the Black" that continues to paint the twisted portrait William Hand's childhood.  This issues tale of murder and mayhem shows just how driven Hand is to kill anyone and how utterly without redemption he really is.  I really love this little bonus tales of depravity and I'm still hoping that we'll see them collected in some sort of replica leather bound volume.

I know that many fans were not thrilled with the idea of a White Lantern from the very beginning when so many fans saw the possiblity, but really you have to know that there's no way you can have all the colors represented as part of an emotional spectrum, throw in the idea of Nekron and Black Lanterns, and not somehow have there be something using white.  And it just makes sense no matter how corny it might sound.  Hey, were suspending our disbelief pretty far as it is, so it's not too much of a stretch in my opinion.

And it had to be Sinestro.  While it may be lead to his ultimate redemption for all his past actions, it just makes sense.  He's the real Darth Vader in the Green Lantern mythology - and he's the one who will benefit the most from this new journey.  In the end will he keep the white power?  I don't think so, but I suspect that Geoff Johns has a plan for him that we're going to love to read in the coming months knowing that Green Lantern is one of three regular books that he's going to continue to write in addition to fulfilling his duties as DC Entertainment's Chief Creative Officer. 
 

Once again Geoff Johns has taken all that we know about the DC Universe and added something new to it that we never knew before without undoing the reality created by his predecessors.  I've read Green Lantern in particular for over thirty five years and while I don't have an encyclopedic knowledge, I feel that I have tred a path that covers pretty much all of the carpet of the the Green Lantern mythos.  And, like he did with Green Lantern: Rebirth, Geoff has revealed that the carpet is bigger than we thought it was and that we'd only been walking in the areas we were aware of, completely in the dark to the existence of a much larger, ricer tapestry.  To me that's a hallmark of a great writer who can add more without taking anything away.

It's such a great time to be Green Lantern fan - five out of five lanterns.

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Blackest Night Theories and Speculation

To me a part of the fun of being a comics fan during events like Blackest Night is speculating on the mysteries and potentials surprises and then seeing if you guessed right. And personally I love being wrong when a writer goes in a different direction than I'm thinking and presents story elements that I never considered - and blows me away with it. 

Image via Wikipedia

For example, on the Raging Bullets podcast I recently talked with the co-hosts, Sean Whelan and Jim Segulin, that when Kyle Rayner died back in Green Lantern Corps number 42 we speculated that Kyle wouldn't stay dead and maybe bring reinforcements from Nekron's dimension.  While we were right in that Kyle wouldn't stay dead, he certainly didn't visit the Realm of the Dead.

So with Blackest Night hitting the last two issues and number seven on the immediate horizon I thought maybe I'd put some of my hunches out there to share with people.  So if you're sensitive to spoilers you may want to look away, although I assure you I have no inside information and haven't seen issue seven yet - so my thoughts are not based on any knowledge of what's to come and represents my GL fanboy speculation.

The biggest thing I've been thinking about is the "Guardians Great Lie" that Black Hand has alluded to.  And I've been under the impression that Nekron's origin is not exactly the great lie that death sentinel was referring to.  I think there's a revelation yet to come that will really make us think about the Guardians' methodology and question the decisions they've been making even more.

A while back Geoff Johns made the comment that the light spectrum split when the first living being used willpower to move under its own power.  He's also made it sound as though this is the second war of light.  I've also been considering the original "Tales of the Green Lantern" miniseries where Nekron first appeared and how he had no knowledge of our dimension until an immortal Maltusan, Krona, was killed by the Guardians and passed through the Realm of the Dead.

Image via Wikipedia

The contradiction to me is that if there were a war of light prior to the aforementioned story, then Nekron should have known of our dimension from the start.  So did the Guardians banish Nekron to the Realm of the Dead and somehow managed to mind-wipe him?  Or are the Guardians only immortal because they made a deal with Nekron and created the Realm of the Dead for him to rule in exchange for him granting them immortality - and then they reneged on the deal?  Certainly a far less altruistic origin for the Guardians than what they have told us.

My other theory has to do with the thought that the first being who shattered the white light was Ion, and that the entities for each emotion sprung forth from a common source, a white being who fractured when it conjured the will to move against Nekron.  The fractured entities fought against Nekron and defeated him.  The Guardians later manipulated things to keep the entities out of the reach of other beings to ensure that they would be able to control the destiny of the universe.

Furthermore my hunch is that this first war of light took place on Earth and that Earth, for all the disdain the Guardians and other species have for it, is so primitive and ruled by emotions because that is the birthplace of the emotional spectrum.  And this is why the Guardians allowed four Earthmen to be Green Lanterns in order to protect Earth and prevent the Guardians' manipulations from coming to light.

I think that the entities are being pulled back to reform the white entity, explaining why we haven't seen Ion or the Predator for months - and why Parallax was yanked away by an unseen force in Green Lantern 51.  I think we're going to see the white entity and he/she/it will be choosing a herald, the dreaded White Lantern that many fans have hoped we wouldn't see since it does seem like it's from a Saturday Morning cartoon.

The Great White Hope?  Image via Wikipedia

Contrary to the popular notion that Hal Jordan will be that White Lantern, I think it will be someone else entirely because Hal is pure willpower, and even though he has proven capable of wielding several of the rings I think that he's already the poster boy for willpower.  I think that the white being will be looking for someone who knows about order, even when that order calls for choices that some might think are wrong.  I'm thinking order is the driving forces based on Dove's ability to destroy the Black Lanterns with a touch and display a white aura.  

And who better to redeem himself than the guy who's sense of creating order drove him to cross the line, the White Lantern to be....Sinestro.  As much as the return of the Green Lantern mythos was a focus of everything Johns has done since Green Lantern: Rebirth, it's also been about the rise and fall and redemption of Sinestro.  If I'm guessing right I don't know what that will mean for Sinestro once the dust from Blackest Night settles.

And maybe I'll be wrong on all accounts - but it's fun to think of the possibilities.

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Review - "Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths"

I recently had an opportunity to preview this week's direct-to-dvd release of "Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths" and jumped at the chance since I've really liked almost all of them so far (Batman: Gotham Knight being the exception).  I'm a sucker for stories set in the multiverse so this is one I've been looking forward to since it was first announced.

Before the review itself there's a little bit of back story to this movie.  Between the "Justice League" animated series and the start of "Justice League: Unlimited" Bruce Timm and company felt that there needed to be a story that bridged the "Starcrossed" movie and the start of the new show to explain how and why there were so many new members.  So Dwayne McDuffie wrote a script for a story called "Justice League: Worlds Collide" that was to be shot as a direct to video production.  This film was scrapped and it's this script which was retooled to become the script for "Crisis on Two Earths".

Red Tornado, Firestorm, Aquaman, Black Canary and Black Lightning represent new recruits for the Justice League in "Crisis on Two Earths".

With that said my first impression of the new film is that, like "Public Enemies", it's got a lot of action, but that's about it.  I liked it, but it once again felt like a movie starring the Trinity with a few other characters thrown in to say it's a Justice League flick.  Flash and Green Lantern aren't given anything of note to do other than take up a few minutes of film to show them in action, at least the Martian Manhunter got a subplot, albeit one that's a little silly in my opinion and derailed the main plot.  I was more taken with the appearance of some of the potential new Justice League members than I was with the use of Flash and Green Lantern. 

Archer has the Flash in his sights.

The film looks great on bluray and some of the fight scenes have some really smooth animation sequences, particularly those between Wonder Woman and Superwoman.  The soundtrack by James Venable fits the darker tone of the movie as well.  And there are some cool cameos in the alternate universe Earth, I geeked out at seeing the interaction between our Flash and the alternate version of Green Arrow.  Lobo was also cool to see as well.  And I won't spoil who the U.S. President is for those who haven't already figured it out or read that elsewhere.

The Crime Syndicate is handled well and you get the sense of them really functioning as a super powered mafia complete with a "family" structure.  The voice work is really good as well.  James Woods is perfect and he's given a meaty role as the psychotic Owlman.  Mark Harmon does a good job with Superman, as does Gina Torres as Superwoman.  Brian Bloom does a great job of channeling Ray Liotta for Ultraman. 

I was really excited to see Nolan North's name associated with Green Lantern and Power Rings' voices, him being the voice behind Nathan Drake in the "Uncharted" games for the PS3.  Oh, and for the record he's the first guy to be both Green Lantern and Deadpool on film having voiced the merc with the mouth on the "Hulk Vs" feature last year.  Unfortunately he just doesn't get enough to do here, although I did enjoy his interactions with the Flash.  My one complaint on the voice acting is William Baldwin as Batman.  I don't know if it's just because Kevin Conroy has become so synonymous with the dark knight that the bar is set too high for us to like anyone else, but Baldwin just doesn't have the right intonations for what I think Batman needs to sound like.

Hal throwing down

In terms of the character design, everyone's costume is pretty much dead on, including GL's white gloves.  I think they got Hal's body a little too spindly and not enough bulk for my own tastes, but other than that he looks okay.  In terms of ring usage we of course get the prerequisite boxing glove and giant hand, but nothing of note in terms of creativity.    I had my hopes up with Hal partnering up with Wonder Woman, but alas he didn't get to do much.  Not to make any accusations, but I wonder how much Green Lantern action got cut from the script when it was changed from John to Hal knowing how much McDuffie likes John.  I can't imagine John's role was so minor in the original script.

Speaking of the script, while it's "dark" there's a couple of things that really kind of bothered me.  Without giving away too much there's a bit where Batman crosses a line that I really didn't think he would with a decision he makes regarding the Flash and Johnny Quick.  The story could have reached the same overall conclusion without having occurred happen, so I question why it was decided to do what they did.  I know that sounds a little vague, but I don't want to spoil anything since this review is coming out before the film is. 

My other issue is Owlman's whole plot - I mean I know he's supposed to be out of his mind but even his plan was a little too irrational for a crazy guy.  In the end it just seems like the film is another "bad guys plots to destroy the universe" action movie without anything thought provoking to make it stand out.  I think the multiverse concept lends itself to some high-concept stories that have a balance of narrative and action and they missed the boat with the ability to tell us more. 

Feel the Spectre's wrath!

The first of the DC animated shorts is also on this disk, this one being the Spectre. I won't say much about it here other than the plot was little too predictable for my tastes.  The animation style is markedly different from the main feature, which is okay because it is a standalone story and it appears like it jumps off the pages of a 1970's comic book.

I think the Spectre is one of those characters who may be too powerful to be used very often, but he'd be a great character to base a horror animation anthology on, preferably on a premium cable channel like HBO that could get away with the adult level animation that should accompany a being who can turn a human into a pile of melting wax.  In fact, after watching this it makes me wish that DC Entertainment would do just that. This short is well done even if the plot is a little predictable, and if this is any indication of what future holds for these DC Showcase episodes I'm looking forward to rest of them.

The preview of "Batman: Under the Red Hood" has me concerned.  The voice acting in the sneak peak sounded awful.  Maybe I'm being over critical and I hope I'm wrong but I didn't end up feeling any anticipation for this one after watching the feature.

The bluray has the pilots for the Lynda Carter Wonder Woman TV show from the '70's and "Mercy Reef", the unaired Aquaman pilot starring Smallville's Green Arrow, Justin Hartley.  I didn't get the chance to watch them yet, but they are a nice bonus to getting the bluray edition.

We of course have the obligatory addition of episodes from the Justice League animated series.  They're good episodes, don't get me wrong, but I think that the majority of people that are buying these features probably already own the Justice League episodes and I'd much rather have some real behind the scenes features on these DTV's or at least a return of the commentary tracks.  And of course there are the "First Looks" for the last three DTV's in the line to advertise them to people who didn't already pick them up - again a waste of space for the majority of the audience who most likely own them already.

"DCU: The New World" is the lone documentary type special feature on this disk, featuring Dan DiDio, Geoff Johns and others discussing the role of the Crisis events in the history of the DC universe.  There's not really anything new for DC fans who've read the books, but it's always cool to see some of the DC talent used to promote the comics on a disk that may help bring a new audience to the medium.  

All in all I'd give this three lanterns.  If you have a bluray player I'd recommend getting that version (why you'd buy it on DVD escapes me anyways) just because of the better picture quality and the extra goodies.

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DC Entertainment - All Will Be Well!

On Thursday, February 18th, Diane Nelson made the announcement that a new five person executive management team would be joining Nelson in steering the ship of Warner Brothers' new company in an attempt to do a better job of realizing the worth of the wealth of characters and stories in the DC Comics catalog.  DC Comics is a part of the larger DC Entertainment company and the immediate need was to fill the shoes of Paul Levitz, who stepped down as publisher of DC Comics.

Front from left, Jim Lee, Diane Nelson and Dan DiDio; rear from left, Patrick Caldon, John Rood and Geoff Johns.  Photo via New York Times.

Succeeding Levtiz is Dan DiDio and Jim Lee, two familiar faces who are now sharing co-publisher duties.  Whether or not this mean Didio will be stepping down as Editor in Chief or not remains to be seen and Didio has remained nebulous about that issue at this early stage of the game.  

John Rood was named as the Executive Vice President in charge of sales, marketing, and business development, returning to Warner Brothers after working at Disney/ABC for several years.  Patrick Caldon will be in charge of finance and administration.

Geoff Johns has also earned a new title in this new endeavor, that of the Chief Creative Officer.  Johns will, in essence, be given the keys to the kingdom to make sure that the toys in DC's sandbox are played with nicely, as well as having a role in the ongoing stories being generated by DC Comics as well as the Vertigo and Milestone brands.  Using his experience with Richard Donner, Johns will be working with Warner Brothers to develop and advise on film and television productions featuring DC's characters.

Some good news for Green Lantern fans is that Johns has met with director Martin Campbell and actor Ryan Reynolds about the upcoming Green Lantern film and he's done some work with the script and met with various departments of the production.  So I'm hoping beyond hope that the insipid scene where Carol and Hal's kiss recharges the ring has long since been exorcised from the script since that first draft leaked on the Internet.  Johns made an interesting comment that Green Lantern is sort of a model for what they want to do going forward and commented on the film, Blackest Night, and "everything spinning out of that", a comment that I find intriguing since Geoff has made several comments on big things coming down the road.  

So what does this mean for us?  Is it a good thing or a bad thing?  I think it comes down to what you think about DiDio and Johns and the work they've done so far.  Personally, I think it's a good thing.  While I may not agree with everything that either of them have ever done, I like how DC Comics have been overall since DiDio came into power and Johns has evolved into one of the best writers in this generation.

It's my opinion that DC is in the best hands it could be in creatively with the formation of DC Entertainment.  I think that the fact that Warners looked within the company to choose its creative leaders shows that they understand that the people who've been doing the job are the best people to lead the charge.  And for all the doubters I would ask them to name their picks for people who have anywhere near the passion that Lee, DiDio and Johns have for DC's stable of characters.

My initial concern with this announcement is that Johns would be cutting back on his writing workload.  But Geoff has said that was also one of his concerns during the negotiations for his new role and that he would continue his work on Green Lantern, the new Flash series, Brightest Day and the Batman: Earth One series of one-shots.  That's a huge relief in my book since I think that John's run on GL has been the best I've read in the thirty five or so years I've been following the characters.

My hope in this is that Nelson and Warner Brothers have found the right mix to bring DC to the forefront in a number of arenas besides the publications of the monthly books.  DC really needs to embrace the digital age with digital comics as another choice for getting the content in addition to the print medium.  And games like "Batman: Arkham Asylum" shows how these characters can so easily transcend the printed page and stories can become interactive entertainment experience when both the intellectual property and the audience is respected.  We need more of those kinds of games to keep the DC universe alive for the next generation to appreciate, not games like "Justice League Heroes".

Likewise it's the same kind of pro-fan attitude that needs to be used when they bring any of the characters to film through tv, motion pictures and direct-to-dvd products.  There's no surprise that "Smallville: Absolute Justice" did so well in the ratings with fans - the characters were handled with the respect for which they are due and we as fans embrace that.  

I think we've had a dynamic shift in how today's audiences respond as compared to my generation.  In my day we got drawn into comics through the comics themselves because it was pretty rare to see superheroes in other mediums.  Sure, we had Superfriends, Power Records, the Superman films and a few tv shows, but not the broad variety of media forms that this generation has access to.  And for many of them video games and all the other things that are out there are what bring them into comics - the comics are their gateway to the characters.  So it's up to the leaders in the industry to find creative ways to harness all the different types of entertainment to draw people to the original printed media in order to keep it alive.  

The comics industry faces some huge challenges as the audience of my generation dwindles.  The only way is to embrace all the new forms of media distribution and use that as a strength, harness the mass appeal that they offer and put the characters out there for them to get the audience that they need to continue to thrive.  

With that in mind I think that Nelson has done a great job in getting the right people for the job.  Admittedly I know nothing about Rood and Caldon, but I have faith in what DC Entertainment is going to do and how they are going to do it.  With an attitude of "no fear" as Nelson has used as her catchphrase for this new era, I think, in the words of the Blue Lantern Corps, "all will be well."

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Green Lantern #51 Review

Green Lantern #51, or should I say Blackest Night #6.75, came out this week picking up with Parallax's return.  Just prior to jumping back into the fray with Parallax's confrontation with Black Lantern Spectre, Johns shows us a little bit of what Black Hand is up to, which isn't much really, other than walking around a smiling evilly.  We also get to see more of what I hope gets expanded on, and that's the Larfleeze / Lex Luthor avarice connection.

While certainly a relationship of comedic proportions, there so much more to it than that.  Lex's drive to defeat Superman is so strong that there's no way that he's going to relinquish his newly found power easily when his time is done as a deputy of the Orange Lantern Corps.  And if there's one being in the universe with the ability to take the power of avarice from Larfleeze, it's got to be Lex Luthor.  We know from the advance solicitations that Larfleeze is going to be on Earth for at least a couple of issues once Blackest Night ends, and given the conversation between he and Lex about how Earth is all about owning things, I am very encouraged that Larfleeze is going to love it here once the dust settles....although we have a hard time getting rid of him.

Their confrontation is interrupted by Doug Mahnke's beautiful two page splash of Parallax and Spectre's clash.  We're reminded that, unlike the last time, Hal Jordan chose to re-bond with Parallax in issue 50, a defining moment where Parallax thinks that he is re-claiming Hal but Hal is really saying that this time it's going to be him in charge of Parallax. 

And we see that this is true, that Hal is more in charge this time when we see Parallax through the Spectre's eyes - he is green at his core with only yellow fear in his cape and extremities.  Parallax and Black Lantern Spectre have some dialogue that Johns uses to explain that the Black Lantern ring claimed Crispus Allen and that it's their bonding that has allowed Nekron to claim the Spectre as one of his soldiers. 

Parallax is able to liberate the Spectre from Nekron's control and it's not really clear to me whether or not the Spectre is still bonded to Crispus Allen or not.  At any rate Parallax is bent on destroying the Spectre, while the Spectre is determined that Parallax will face God's wrath even if it's at the expense of Hal Jordan.

Parallax rips the face off of the Spectre in a delightfully ghoulish bit of art by Mahnke, and I'm not sure who it is looking out through the Spectre's right eye.  Sinestro re-enters the fray as he seeks to claim Parallax for  himself, and Atrocitus seeks to claim the Spectre as the entity for the red power of rage.  A geek-out moment arrives with Spectre does indeed go all Red Lantern on everyone, but only for a moment until the Spectre regains control.  There's a neat touch as both the Spectre's cape an cowl as well as his word balloons tranform mid-panel to reflect the Spectre's swift expulsion of the Red Lantern Corps power.

The Spectre reveals that there already is an entity for the pure power of rage and warns Atrocitus not to seek it out as he has already faced it.  In the one moment of the book that I was disappointed in, Hal is pulled free from Parallax not from his own conquering of the fear entity, but by his anchor to Carol through his love of her.  Now, don't get me wrong that I think that Carol and Hal shouldn't have a relationship - there's is an example of a love has a strength born from the inability for the two of them to reconcile.  There's is a love fated to never quite be fully realized and it's the romantic tension between the two that adds so much to their screen time together.

For me there are two Hal driven moments that I want to see from Blackest Night, one being Hal encountering one or both parents as Black Lanterns, and the other seeing Hal defeat Parallax completely on his own.  So for Carol to be his savior, while perhaps underscoring their love for each other, in my opinion lessens the dramatic purpose of Hal choosing to bond with Parallax.  Hal's the guy that jumps out of the plane without a parachute knowing he figure out a way out of it on his way down - but here he jumped out of the plane and someone else got him out of it.  I think Hal needed to defeat that demon on his own like John Stewart threw off the weight of his past in Green Lantern #49.  So I feel a little cheated by the scene, so I hope we see Martin Jordan some time soon.

What happens next is very, very intriguing.  Before Sinestro can claim the Parallax entity it is mysteriously pulled away by some as-yet-unknown force.  And then we flash to Belle Reve where Hector Hammond senses that "It has Parralax."  This is of huge significance since we know that the Predator entity of the Star Sapphires is on the loose, Ion is probably still trapped within Sodam Yat at the center of Daxam's sun, and there's a red entity out there somewhere.  Whether "it" is something we'll see in Blackest Night or dealt with later remains to be seen, but in my own fanboy speculation I'm thinking that this is linked to the "Guardian's Great Lie" that Black Hand has been going on about and we're about to see the true origin of life in our universe not the one that the Guardians have wanted us to believe.

The Spectre joins the New Guardian battle with Nekron, only we find that since Nekron has no soul the Spectre can do absolutely nothing to him.  The art here by Mahnke is again brilliant as he shows the Spectre lunging through Nekron and dissolving away, leaving the issue with Nekron's ominous claim that "The Universe will die now."

Other than Carol saving Hal I loved the issue.  It read really fast, that's for sure, although it could just be that I'm so into this story that I read it faster than normal because I am truly loving it so much.  Like the Sinestro Corps War, Blackest Night is an action filled epic filled with jaw dropping moments and great action.  The art by everyone involved has been stellar every step of the way, and this issue continues to relieve any doubts I had when it was announced that Doug Mahnke was taking over for Ivan Reis.  I couldn't be happier with the choice that DC made with the choice of Mahnke as this issue of Green Lantern continues to add to a run that's going to go down as one of the most outstanding runs of any series in comics history.

Four out of five lanterns.

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Green Lantern Corps #45 Review

With Guy Gardner fulling consumed by rage, it's up to Kyle Rayner, Kilowog, and Soranik Natu to rally the rest of the Green Lantern Corps to get Guy under control in this week's issue of Green Lantern Corps, the forty fifth issue by writer Peter Tomasi.

Guy Gardner is one tough S.O.B. on this own, but adding the red power of rage to the mix ups the ante a bit, and it takes all the willpower that the Corps has left to keep Kyle in check on the surface of Mogo.  Readers will remember that the Corps were ripped from the surface of OA by Mogo and pulled to safety there while the Black Lanterns were all dragged to the inner core of the largest Green Lantern to burn in perpetuity in last month's issue.

While the humanoid members of the corps cannot help Guy, it's Mogo who once again shines in this issue.  Mogo forces Kyle to see relive his life through the green and red rings, demonstrating how Guy, like all of us, is the product of all we have experienced in our life.  The two page spread by Pat Gleason does a nice job of showing us some of the highlights of Guy's past, including the famous "one punch" altercation with Batman, his high school footballs days, and so on.  I thought it was really cool how each memory was in a bubble colored either red or green depending on the type of experience.

There's also some use of constructs in the form of Ice and Guy's father.  Without going into too much history, Guy's father was one of those pushy sports dads that really had a bad affect on Guy.  If you're still relatively new to the character and want to know more about Guy's past, Chuck Dixon wrote a four part "Yesterday's Sins" story arc in Guy's solo title from the 1990's that's really good.  It's never been collected to my knowledge, but some online retailers may have them in back issues.  Over at Atomic Avenue, an online comic store portal where hundreds of collectors like myself sell their unwanted books, you can find all four of those issues for a dollar or less per issue. 

Once Munk, or Indigo-2, tells Kyle that they cannot remove Guy's red ring without killing him, Kyle is faced with the prospect that there may be no Hope for Guy, pun intended.  There are some nice character moments between Kyle and Kilowog as Kyle comes to the realization that Guy may not be able to be saved and the Corps will be forced to kill Guy.

Mogo rises to the occasion once again and sucks Guy into a pool of nutrients and begins to filter his blood, absorbing the red infestation in Mogo's.  Now, as cool as it sounds, the one thing that popped into my head was that Mogo has now taken on the Black Lanterns and the red rage within Guy - but could there be side affects?  Time will tell if there are ramifications to this or if it was just a convenient way to resolve both problems with no repercussions.  At any rate Gleason does a great job of showing the hideous thought of having thousands of tiny things writhing around inside and outside your body and Guy has one of the creepiest experiences since he rejected his Vuldarian powers during Green Lantern: Rebirth.

This works and Guy is once again his old normal self as the red ring leaves to find a new host (let's hope it isn't Mogo).  As Kyle helps Guy to his feet we are treated to an uncharacteristic show of emotion from Guy as he embraces Kyle, cementing them as the icon for the strongest bromance in the Green Lantern Corps.

All kidding aside, I think it's a nice show of growth for Guy.  There was a time when I couldn't have cared less for his character because there was so much focus on him being a complete a-hole.  But he's gone from that to being a much broader character than the one trick pony he was year's ago, and I'm glad for that.

The issue ends with a nice scene of the Corps charging up before they get teleported to Earth by the newly arrived Indigo Tribe to join the fray in Blackest Night.

All in all this was a good issue.  It didn't thrill me and I got the overall feeling that Green Lantern Corps #45 was a pause in the story before moving ahead towards the conclusion of Blackest Night.  I don't know if that's due to the skip month in the main event title or not, but I just kinda felt like it was a "pause, let's catch our breath" kind of issue - not that that's a bad thing at all.  Guy's situation had to either be rectified or he had to control the red power of rage before the Corps involvement could move ahead.  But a part of me would have liked for Guy to have resolved the issue a little more independently- I would have liked to see him have a moment like John Stewart did in Green Lantern #49 where he got a chance to shine.

This issue draws us closer to the end of Tomasi and Gleason's run on the title before Tony Bedard and Ardian Syaf take over.  Tomasi will be taking Guy Gardner with him on his new Green Lantern: Emerald Warriors title as announced a week or so ago.  So it will be interesting to see how Bedard uses Kyle with John Stewart and Ganthet going forward - and maybe even more interesting is the thought that there may be a new Green Lantern added to the ranks to replace John Stewart as Hal's partner if John is permanently assigned to Oa.

All in all this issue gets four out of five lanterns.

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New GL Stuff From Toy Fair

The 2010 Toy Fair started on Valentines Day in New York City and runs for four days.  Amongst the hallowed halls of plastic ecstasy were the first glimpses of a number of new Green Lantern related products that will be hitting store shelves during the rest of the year.  Here's a summary of what's been spotted so far that wasn't already included in my previous entry on Green Lantern products for 2010:

Fisher Price:

As a part of their Imaginext product line geared for younger children is a Green Lantern Hal Jordan figure complete with a jet construct.  The jet fires a green projectile out the front.  This product is actually available now from  Fisher Price's website for $12.

DC Direct:

DCD Direct continues to put out some great collectible props and actions figures and on top of all the stuff I mentioned earlier, there's even more Green Lantern product coming that we knew about before.

There have been three other prop batteries released in the past, but making an appearance this year will be a Sinestro Corps power battery and ring.  Like the previous props the ring will turn the light on the center light of the battery.  The battery looks to be a repaint of the Green Lantern battery, with a modified handle and the logo redone for the top.

There going to be a two-pack of Green Lantern figures if the origins line of figures that DC Direct is putting out.  The Green Lantern pack consists of a Alan Scott and Hal Jordan figure and should be released in September.

The wallet breaking freight train of Blackest Night figures continues as DC Direct also announced another wave of figures based on the blockbuster hit.  This is wave 6 in the line if I haven't miscounted.  This new wave features an updated Hal Jordan figure, Black Lantern Hawkgirl, Blue Lantern Flash, and Star Sapphire Wonder Woman.

In the JLA Classified Classics line there's also another Hal Jordan figure, although I think it's one of the worst looking Hal figures I've seen in a long time.  This figure is part of the third wave in this series with an anticipated December release date.

WizKids:

In May WizKids is set to release a starter pack of Blackest Night inspired characters for their HeroClix game.  The seven figure set includes Hal Jordan and the six deputies of the various Lantern Corps.

Mattel:

There are a number of new items coming from Mattel this year that include Green Lantern. 

A Green Lantern Batman and a Sinestro figure are set to join the line of figures based off of the popular "Batman: The Brave and the Bold" animated series.

It looks like the "Infinite Heroes" line of 3 3/4" figures are getting a name change to link them to DC's 75th anniversary.  Included in their launch is a repackaged version of Hal Jordan, a green translucent Guy Gardner variation, and a new 3 pack featuring Kyle-lax, Sinestro Corps Sinestro and a green translucent John Stewart.

 Alan Scott joins the DC Universe Classics line in Wave 14 and Walmart will be getting an exclusive five pack of DCUC Green Lantern figures including Tomar Re, Guy Gardner, John Stewart with his Mosaic era costume, grey templed Hal Jordan and a Green Lantern Sinestro. 

There are still a couple more days left in this year's Toy Fair event, so if you're like me and cannot head to the event, take a look at the Cool Toy Review website.   They've done a great job covering the event for the rest of us poor slobs and have the high quality versions of the small pictures I've included in this post and I thank them for letting me use some of their pictures here so that I could give photo reference to all the Green Lantern goodness to be had this year.  They have a huge collection of photos from not only the DC related products, but all the major toy lines being shown in NYC this week.  So check them out.

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Big Green Lantern Corps Changes

There was a major Green Lantern related announcement today regarding the Green Lantern Corps title and the launch of a third Green Lantern monthly book.

Over on the DCU blog, The Source, it was revealed that Pete Tomasi will be leaving the Green Lantern Corps title as well as artist Pat Gleason.  While that may sound like bad news, the good news is that Tomasi will be the writer of a third GL title, "Green Lantern: Emerald Warriors", that will star Guy Gardner with frequent appearances by Kilowog.  The art for the new book will be by Fernando Pasarin, who's done work with the JSA relaunch.  Pat Gleason will be one of the regular artists on the bi-weekly Brightest Day book.

Picking up the writing chores of the Green Lantern Corps will be Tony Bedard with art by Ardian Syaf, who did the artwork in the Blackest Night: Batman mini.  Guy Gardner leaves such a whole in the book that it will take two characters to fill it: John Stewart and Green Lantern Ganthet - yes, that's right, Ganthet remains a GL at the end of Blackest Night and does not return to being a Guardian. And...if John Stewart is stationed to Oa - does that mean that there will be a new Green Lantern for Sector 2814 as Hal's backup?

That's great news for fans who like John Stewart, since he's really gotten the short end of the stick and really deserves more time in the spotlight.  With Bedard on as the writer is lends more credence to the rumor that R.E.B.E.L.S. might be the previously announced co-feature in the book, although I still hold out hope that the co-feature will spotlight the other Corps in the emotional spectrum.

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Tim Robbins Cast for GL and GL Animated?

Last night on The Hollywood Reporter's Heat Vision blog posted news that Oscar winning actor Tim Robbins has been cast in the Green Lantern live action film.  The film begins shooting next month in New Orleans, where it has been reported that over two hundred people are constructing sets as we speak amidst all the post-Super Bowl hoopla.

Robbins, who won his Academy Award for "Mystic River", will be playing Senator Hammond, the disapproving father of Hector Hammond.  Hector is being playing by Peter Sarsgaard and will be one of two main villains in the film if the plot has stayed consistent with the first draft of the script that was leaked on the Internet.  Hector Hammond is of course destined to be mutated into a being with a genius intellect and highly evolved telepathic and telekinetic powers to the point that he no longer needs to speak, choosing to converse with the powers of his mind.

There are still several other roles to be filled that we should be hearing announcements about very soon, including Martin Jordan, Kilowog, Abin Sur, Tomar Re and the Guardians.  Given the short time span before filming begins I imagine that director Martin Campbell is furiously working on getting these casting decisions resolved as the first day of filming looms on the horizon.

In other news, there is a rumor floating about that Warner Brothers is preparing a CG Green Lantern animated series for 2011 produced by none other than Bruce Timm.  What little information about the show comes from a source not linked with the animation department, but from toy marketing.  Here's how the story goes:

Someone who works in the toy industry posted on the Action Figure Insider forums that WB has three new animated series in the works for Cartoon Network and that those shows were being pitched to companies like Mattel, Bandai, and Hasbro for the tie-in toys.  The three shows were a new Scooby Doo show, a Young Justice show, and the CG Green Lantern show.

The poster claims to have also seen five minutes of footage from the GL show that s/he says is "stunning" and featured Hal Jordan in space.  The poster also also gave the roster for the propsed Young Justice show and since then a couple of concept art pieces popped up supporting some of the claims.  Several of the posts and the art were removed from the sites they originally appeared on, but not before people grabbed copies of them.

No one knows exactly how much credibility there is to the the statements,  however the art leaks add some weight to it being true.  Warner Brothers is said to be making some big announcements in the next few weeks including news on DC Entertainment, so perhaps we'll see some sort of official word coming out of that.  If true, I certainly hope that the show is along the lines of the previous Timmverse in terms of tone.

It wouldn't be the frist time that Warner Brothers worked on a Green Lantern animated series.  Years ago Bruce Timm and company pitched the idea to WB complete with some character designs that had been worked up.  That show was to be more a light affair similar to what we see in the "Batman: The Brave and the Bold" animated series.  WB thankfully shot that idea down, but the character designs were later reused for the "Duck Dodgers" episode "The Green Loontern" that can be found on the bluray edition of "Green Lantern: First Flight".

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Blackest Night Wonder Woman #3 Review

The final issue of the Wonder Woman Blackest Night mini-series arrived this week and frankly I'm really surprised with it...and not in a good way.  I love the Wonder Woman character, and I think Greg Rucka really gets the character and is a very good writer - and Nicola Scott is one of the favorite artists.  So why do I feel so let down?

From the get go this mini series really didn't have a point other than to flesh out how Diana's unique ability to go from Black Lantern to Star Sapphire fly's in the face of what we've seen so far, and I'm really cool with that.  But the mini as a whole seems like it lacks any other purpose and it seems like there's an opportunity with Mera to really define her for readers that's completely wasted.  

This issues starts out with some neat introspection by Wonder Woman about what it's like to wear a power ring.  As a reader and a fan you wonder what it's like to have that much power on one finger and Diana gives us a glimpse at what we can only dream of.  She and Carol have some great conversation and I loved her observation of Carol and Hal's relationship, that "Loving him from afar is not worthy of him, or you."  It gives me some hope that Hal and Carol will be on the road to either finally moving their relationship forward or getting some other final resolution.

Diana gets some resolution with Max Lord, and Diana just loves him to pieces.....literally.  The rest of the issue is devoted to Mera as Diana tries to break her free from the grips of the red power of rage.  Now when we first got the deputies to the New Guardians, I understood why they were chosen; it made sense for Barry Allen to be the deputy for the Blue Lanterns, and so on.  But Mera was the one question mark for me because I'm just not that familiar with her character and I think that I'm pretty much in the majority group who just are that well versed in Aquaman's universe.

So I was hoping to see why Mera has so much rage other than the Black Lantern-izing of Aquaman and Aqualad.  And as we get to the point in the issue the opportunity is completely wasted on me.  We find that Mera's hatred and rage is founded in self-loathing, but why is left to us to decode in a two page splash that has no words to explain anything.

While I am well versed on what happened to all the characters that Nekron reclaimed in Blackest Night #6, it was a great piece of writing to give readers a one or two sentence explanation for those people who just jumped this event without the reading history to know what's happened in the past.  Here there's no explanation of what's come before, so those pictures tell me nothing and there isn't anything that follows that tells us anything more than the fact that Mera hid something from Aquaman - don't know what it is other than that it involves Black Manta and a baby.

Likewise I really didn't like the Wonder Woman / Batman thing.  It doesn't appeal to me and I think it flies in the face of the relationship that Diana has going on in her own book.  I just don't see Diana as the kind of person who would have a romantic relationship with one person, to the point of going through "mating rituals" of the Amazons if she secretly had the hots for Batman.  Maybe I'm wrong, but it doesn't work for me.

So while I liked Nicola Scott's art in the book, the wasted opportunity to help us learn more and understand Mera and the Batman love stuff just kind of ruined it for me.  Two lanterns on this one.

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