Green Lantern #1 Review
As the DC relaunch sweeps across September, the effects have reached the Green Lantern titles! Sinestro is back in green, Hal is back on earth, and we can do nothing but sit back and watch! Let’s get started with the inaugural issue of the relaunched Green Lantern title!
Green Lantern #1
This debut issue of Green Lantern establishes that roughly two months have passed, and a lot has happened after Green Lantern #67. Hal is jobless, car-less, and money-less, on the verge of losing his home and has nothing to hold him afloat. Sinestro has been released by The Guardians to protect his sector, and is wondering why the Sinestro Corps has turned his homeworld into a dictatorship, which has too much irony to even mention. It seems Sinestro needs Hal though, as he shows to speak with him with an interesting proposition, which will play out next month.
Geoff Johns kicks off the new volume of GL with an obvious change of status quo, tone, and focus of the series. We’re back to focusing on Hal’s story, which was something missing in the series since Blackest Night began. The story in this issue eerily reminds me of what was great about volume three of Green Lantern from the 1990′s: Hal being good old Hal, barely holding everything afloat, while trying to figure everything out as it comes at him, and Carol riding his back in order to straighten him out. In the ’90′s series, it came off cheesy at times, but with Geoff Johns’ tone and approach to the story, it brings together the story in a very human, understandable way.
This issue does serve as a great jumping-on point for the desired new readers, although the background information provided in-story kind of throws the pacing off at times, and is a little repetitive for old readers. However this does seem to be one of the best, truly Hal focused stories we’ve seen out of Geoff in quite a while, so it’s totally worth the nitpicks. I will also point out that Geoff has added a more dimensional status quo to the book, by adding repercussions into Hal’s civilian life that are direct consequences of his superheroics. This series has gained a more realistic foundation that will serve it well if it’s utilized correctly.
Doug Mahnke also seems to have changed up his artistic approach to this series, and I’m seeing a lot of things I like. His previously-impressive rendition of Sinestro has gotten even more amazing and is a truly unique-yet-classical look for the character. The DCU relaunch seems to have had very little effect on Green Lantern, visually speaking, but it is worth noting that Hal and Carol both look a bit younger than they did in the last few years. I can’t wait to see how much Doug’s approach to GL action has changed, especially considering the extremely different way Hal’s construct-forming has been shown by Jim Lee over in Justice League. I’d have to say that Mahnke did a far superior job on this issue than he had done on any GL issue for the better part of the last year, and he does a great job of putting the script to the page.
Overall I’d have to give the team some props for putting out a higher-standard book than they had in the past, with a renewed focus on Hal, a strong layer of foundation for what’s coming, an added complexity to the characters and status quo, and a story that draws you in steadily until it can sink it’s claws into you on the last page. Definitely worth picking up. Only reason it’s not getting 100 is because this isn’t the blow-your-face-off- story a score of 100 deserves.
A COMIC BOOK BLOG RATING
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
| Renewed focus, great additions to the character and relationship dynamics, and a great feel to a relaunched Green Lantern book. | I can honestly find no fault with this book, be it with the script, story, art, or paper quality for that matter. |
| Rating |
Green Lantern #1 by Geoff Johns and Doug Mahnke and was one of 10 titles picked in our Where To Start Reading: The DC Comics Relaunch.
More Green Lantern @ acomicbookblog.com/tag/green-lantern
2 Comments
Yeah, I think this relaunched (err… renumbered) series of Green Lantern is going to be well worth following. As long as Hal Jordan gets whooped by Batman at some point!
This issue didn’t move me one way or the other. However; I am looking forward to how Sinestro is going to deal with his planet being held under siege by his former Corps. Actually, I hope the story gets dragged out.