When Green Lanter became a villain

[son_ofgolem]

What was your reaction to Hal Jordan becoming a villain in the 90s??

[j9ac9k]

Badly written, out of character, editorially-mandated "event" based solely on shock value to boost sales.

[Johnny]

Destroyed a good character for no reason. Could've just retired him, but instead they chose to tarnish him for the sake of shock value 'cause apparently it was the cool thing to do in the 90s. And if he somehow managed to survive that, then a moronic movie studio finished the job in 2011. Poor Hal, apparently good publicity will never be one of his many accomplishments.

[Buried Alien]

I didn't like it at all, but it passed in time.

Buried Alien (The Fastest Post Alive!)

[Vampire Savior]

I had a friend who introduced me to it in the late 90s. Or, actually it was probably the early 00s. We were both little kids. I was hardcore into Spider-Man, and one day he asked me if I ever heard of Green Lantern. I was familiar with the character a little bit from Kingdom Come and Superfriends. We both thought Parallax was awesome. He looked cool and was just a great villain. And the fact that he was the legit main character of the title for decades made the whole thing all the more fascinating and epic.

It's not like my friend didn't like Hal Jordan, though. His favorite story was probably when Kyle got sent through time and met the Legion and his descendant, and then he met a young Hal Jordan after that.

[BohemiaDrinker]

The story came to Brazil around 1995, so I guess I was about 14.

I didn't like it.

I never liked Hal Jordan and was ok with him removed from the DCU, but the story rang false. Seemed illogical. And although I didn't like Jordan I saw no point in the destruction of the corps.

Fun fact is: I never saw Hal Jordan as a villain.

I remember reading Zero Hour as a kid and thinking "guys, he's trying to fix shit. LET HIM FIX SHIT!"

[Jim Kelly]

I didn't like it at all, but it passed in time.

But it took a lot longer than it really needed to--and in the meanwhile Rich Morrissey (DC super-fan and leader of the movement to restore Hal's honour) passed away, as did John Broome, Gil Kane and Julius Schwartz (the men who created Hal Jordan). For their sakes, I'll never be okay with how DC man-handled Mr. Jordan.

[Anthony Shaw]

Badly written, out of character, editorially-mandated "event" based solely on shock value to boost sales.

Aye....

Destroyed a good character for no reason. Could've just retired him, but instead they chose to tarnish him for the sake of shock value 'cause apparently it was the cool thing to do in the 90s.

....and Aye again!

[The Darknight Detective]

Badly written, out of character, editorially-mandated "event" based solely on shock value to boost sales.

All of the above. Hal deserved to be either retired or even killed off like Barry, but not this crap. Oh, for the people who think it was okay because he was "boring" to you, there are enough people out there who feel the same way about your favorite characters, too. It would be just as wrong for them to get the same treatment, IMO.

[SiegePerilous02]

I know it more by reputation than anything else. i guess you had to be there at the time to think it was a good idea, but it seems extremely dumb to me.
I've been meaning to track it down at some point. I don't want to pay money for it but if I ever see the new Kyle trades (is it in there?) in a book store or library I will flip through them. I don't know if I'm inclined to give it a fair shake though. I'm familiar enough with Marz's writing that his style + Kyle (who even Morrison, Johns and Waid can only muster a "he's ok in small doses" out of me) + a premise for Hal and the GL mythos I REALLY don't like, it probably won't do it for me.

[skyvolt2000]

All of the above. Hal deserved to be either retired or even killed off like Barry, but not this crap. Oh, for the people who think it was okay because he was "boring" to you, there are enough people out there who feel the same way about your favorite characters, too. It would be just as wrong for them to get the same treatment, IMO.

But when it has been done to the likes of Wally, Jason Rsuch, ESPECIALLY John Stewart, Cassandra Cain and others-it's supported.

And when folks take a stand in NOT supporting books-they get called out for not being "real" fans.

The thing is stuff like this does not happen when-

1) you don't BUY it. I can't cry about Inhumans vs X-Men or HIC when I BUY it. You can't take that rage out on the writer. You made the choice to buy it.
2) Push back to new original characters. Folks getting replace does not happen when new original folks are supported.

The editor at the time, Kevin Dooley, didn't do himself any favours by insulting any fans that were critical of the change and essentially telling them to go away, because they were yesterday's readers and this was for the new kids.

John Stewart got buried too as that guy was the editor of HIS book. Not to mention Green Arrow, Justice League, Guy Gardner & Black Lightning.
2 books victims of editorial interference. 2 books removing the lead. 1 removing fan favorites and killing one off.

[The Darknight Detective]

But when it has been done to the likes of Wally, Jason Rsuch, ESPECIALLY John Stewart, Cassandra Cain and others-it's supported.

Not by me. You will never, ever see me support beating up a long-time character for whatever reason. Besides, I like all the ones you mentioned and have the comics to prove it!

[Johnny]

But when it has been done to the likes of Wally, Jason Rsuch, ESPECIALLY John Stewart, Cassandra Cain and others-it's supported.

Who supported what happened to Wally in Heroes in Crisis? When John Stewart was supposedly planned to get killed, noone supported it, Fialkov even left the book in protest. Whataboutism doesn't work here because Emerald Twilight was a totally different situation.

And when folks take a stand in NOT supporting books-they get called out for not being "real" fans.

There is really no such thing as "real" fans or "fake" fans, it makes no difference to me whether some people choose to take some imaginary stand by not supporting a book that happens to feature a character I like. Whatever helps them sleep at night.

John Stewart got buried too as that guy was the editor of HIS book. Not to mention Green Arrow, Justice League, Guy Gardner & Black Lightning.

False equivalence. Hal was the only one who was tarnished beyond recognition and his fans were the ones told to shut up and leave. I don't recall DC ever telling fans of the characters you mentioned to go away.

[SiegePerilous02]

But when it has been done to the likes of Wally, Jason Rsuch, ESPECIALLY John Stewart, Cassandra Cain and others-it's supported.

Care to provide some evidence of this, especially for Wally? I don't think anyone is supporting that.

From my experience, Cass's treatment was met with apathy at worst from the people who don't really care for her, not a lot of active support.

Complaining about what was done to Hal Jordan doesn't mean one condones what is being done to these other characters. And every Hal Jordan thread doesn't have to be derailed by mention of these characters all the time either.

[Jim Kelly]

Even though I eventually got to like Kyle Rayner, it's hard to see what the big difference was between him and Hal Jordan. Later on he was retconned into having a diverse family tree (the same could have been done with Jordan), but initially he was just another white, American on Earth with the ring. There was no attempt to expand the possible candidates to people of colour or other nationalities or women or aliens. I think if the new Green Lantern had been distinctly different from Hal, then it would have been an easier sell. Readers would have seen that DC was trying to be more inclusive with one of their top tier characters and they would have had some patience to see how it all worked out.

Not only were we being asked to accept Kyle was somehow different from Hal, but we also had to accept that our hero was not a hero. Actually, when I got around to reading Zero Hour, I found myself on Hal's side. A previous reboot of the timeline had produced this wonky continuity--another one might get us a better continuity. Given the rules of the DC Universe as they were set down at the time, Hal's objective seemed like the best thing to do. We were in the worst timeline and some drastic action had to be taken to restore the better timeline. I really didn't like all the other DC super-heroes getting in Hal's way--if they had just let him do what he wanted, it would have all worked out fine. They were to blame for it all going Pete Tong.