Green Lantern #0 Review

After being teased by a new Green Lantern earlier in the year the mystery is revealed; DC Universe meet Simon Baz.

Green Lantern #0

Can you believe it’s been nearly eight years since Geoff Johns began his run on Green Lantern with Rebirth? In an era with updated creator solicitations almost weekly it’s easy to overlook mainstream creators on long character runs (Brubaker on Captain America and Grant Morrison on Batman are other examples). Even more interesting perhaps, in his nearly eight years of writing the book, Simon Baz is the first human Green Lantern created by Geoff Johns.

Yeah. I checked.

And to his credit Simon Bax is pretty interesting.

While (what seems like) the game of who-can-be-the-most-multicultural-comic-universe can get a bit tiresome and using 9-11 seems a bit…I dunno…easy (?) Simon Bax is interesting as a Green Lantern; more interesting than another square-chinned middle class tough guy. And as an origin story his is far from typical. Simon Baz is a criminal. Yes, a criminal with justified means and yes, he’s still a good guy at heart but also someone who’s fallen on hard times and is compromising his morals before he gets in costume and it becomes the cool thing to do.

His premier issue though, not so interesting.

Admittingly I haven’t been reading Geoff Johns New 52 Green Lantern but I’ve missed the Corps and thought I’d try hopping on the new “jumping on point.” Unfortunately though I don’t feel any more on board than I was previously, aside of course from now knowing that the new Green Lantern is Simon Bax, which in itself doesn’t do me much. I found it a little strange that the story didn’t go anywhere other than a new character getting a ring – an assumption I made long before opening the issue since it was right there on the cover. In fact, the cover is more revealing about his Green Lantern role than anything we read.

Which I can understand; the teased new Green Lantern from the Free Comic Book Day issue (which you can read here) on the cover lets you know where to look for more information, except there wasn’t much information. You meet Simon Bax, and maybe what you get here is enough to start liking him (as is my case) but if you were looking to “jump on” to Green Lantern and catch up (as was my case) you got nothing, and if you were looking to see why Simon Bax was picked or what he’s going to do with it you also got nothing. Heck, if you were looking for any Green Lantern action you really got nothing. Even the cliffhanger at the end I can only assume meant something I’m out of the loop on.

But it did get me excited for the new Green Lantern.

And to be fair it’s my first issue of the series, perhaps being out of the loop isn’t anyone fault but my own.

And to be even more fair I thought Doug Mahnke and the rest of the art team killed it (although, I wish I got to see more Green Lantern action).

And to keep pouring the fairness on I’m pretty sure I’ll buy Green Lantern #13 and see if I can keep up.

So maybe it accomplished just enough. I didn’t get the green space action I’ve been missing, I’ve still got a lot of questions about the new guy that Superman is beating the heck out of in a future event, and I thought the cliffhanger was an odd choice but I’m buying the next issue and enjoyed the read…sounds like a win.

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Tags: Doug Mahnke Geoff Johns Green Lantern Slider