Oa - Green Lantern in it's entirety Appreciation Thread

[Redjack]

this is the GL FUTURE STATE mood:

[Robanker]

this is the GL FUTURE STATE mood:

You're making the wait real hard.

[Frontier]

I guess every franchise needs to go Mad Max at some point...

[J. D. Guy]

Not really. People do it all the time because it's public social commentary. I think, unfortunately, that Thorne's public statements are going to undermine the success of the book and make Green Lantern fandom even more divisive than it currently is. Publicly hating on the most popular character in the Lantern verse isn't going to win you readers, in fact, it's going to cost them.

See, this feels like normalizing such off-putting behavior like what that twitter user showcased, while ignoring why it's off-putting and why, with context, it's of an unsettling air, in the first place.

[Bored at 3:00AM]

I will certainly be checking out Redjack's Green Lantern because I have been waiting for John Stewart to get another real shot since Mosaic got cancelled before the first issue was even published. Van Jensen took a decent crack at it, but was stymied by the post-Johns New 52 crossover crap-fest

The realities of modern social media have changed things radically. Would Flash fans have given Waid's run a shot if they knew he thought Barry Allen was boring from his social media posts? Would more GL fans have given Kyle Rayner a chance if Marz & Dooley hadn't spent years saying Hal was boring and turned him into a villain? Would Kyle fans have bought Tomasi's GLCorps comics if they'd known he wasn't a fan of Kyle? These days, every reader counts and we can't afford to lose anyone if a comic is going to keep getting published.

There's unfortunately a long sad history of characters being treated badly that splintered GL fandom into a bunch of dumb tribes. The solution moving forward is NOT to continue this. Nobody has to be forced to like every GL equally, but respect needs to be given to ALL Green Lanterns.

Otherwise, we're just repeating the same mistakes over and over again.

[Frontier]

I will certainly be checking out Redjack's Green Lantern because I have been waiting for John Stewart to get another real shot since Mosaic got cancelled before the first issue was even published. Van Jensen took a decent crack at it, but was stymied by the post-Johns New 52 crossover crap-fest

The realities of modern social media have changed things radically. Would Flash fans have given Waid's run a shot if they knew he thought Barry Allen was boring from his social media posts? Would more GL fans have given Kyle Rayner a chance if Marz & Dooley hadn't spent years saying Hal was boring and turned him into a villain? Would Kyle fans have bought Tomasi's GLCorps comics if they'd known he wasn't a fan of Kyle? These days, every reader counts and we can't afford to lose anyone if a comic is going to keep getting published.

There's unfortunately a long sad history of characters being treated badly that splintered GL fandom into a bunch of dumb tribes. The solution moving forward is NOT to continue this. Nobody has to be forced to like every GL equally, but respect needs to be given to ALL Green Lanterns.

Otherwise, we're just repeating the same mistakes over and over again.

I didn't know that. I thought Tomasi did a solid job with Kyle in that run. The worst thing I remember him doing was lying to Soranik once...well, that and he died so Guy could go Red Lantern.

[Bored at 3:00AM]

See, this feels like normalizing such off-putting behavior like what that twitter user showcased, while ignoring why it's off-putting and why, with context, it's of an unsettling air, in the first place.

It's an unfortunate reality of modern economics and politics. Whatever anyone's said or done in the past can come back to haunt you in the future. There's no stopping it. There's always going to be people out there with too much time on their hands searching through our online history's.

I certainly hope that this won't mean lost sales for Redjack's Green Lantern, but I would be lying if I didn't think it was a distinct possibility. It shouldn't matter, but with the current size of comics readership, it might.

I think our best move as fans should be to encourage anyone we know who is feeling put off by this to give the book a chance. These kinds of things can fizzle pretty quickly if the comic is great and initial sales are strong.

[Bored at 3:00AM]

I didn't know that. I thought Tomasi did a solid job with Kyle in that run. The worst thing I remember him doing was lying to Soranik once...well, that and he died so Guy could go Red Lantern.

Exactly, in the end, it shouldn't matter as long as the comics are good. Plenty of creators have found gold with characters they previously thought were uninteresting.

Waid ended up telling some fun comics with Barry Allen and I think Marz grew to appreciate why Hal was so beloved near the end of his run. Johns didn't get the appeal of Power Girl at first but ended up writing some of her best stories.

[km_sus]

I'm more than willing to give this new creative team a chance...

However, I won't lie and say that it is a bit weird that Thorne dislikes Hal Jordan to such an extreme degree. I believe him when he says it won't affect his writing, but it is strange that he dwells on Hal so much. I mean we have all characters we dislike, but this is like the writer of a Doom patrol book stating - over multiple years - that he doesn't really care for and actually really dislikes Robotman, or something. It's not deal breaking. Just a strange, peculiar chip in this book's armour.

[lemonpeace]

I'm more than willing to give this new creative team a chance...

However, I won't lie and say that it is a bit weird that Thorne dislikes Hal Jordan to such an extreme degree. I believe him when he says it won't affect his writing, but it is strange that he dwells on Hal so much. I mean we have all characters we dislike, but this is like the writer of a Doom patrol book stating - over multiple years - that he doesn't really care for and actually really dislikes Robotman, or something. It's not deal breaking. Just a strange, peculiar chip in this book's armour.

it's not that weird, subtracting the bits specific to Parallax!Hal, a lot of these critiques mirror how vocal DC fans speak about John. One thing that became abundantly clear under Johns, and even now under Snyder, Taylor, and Tynion, is that these writers are just fans like us; it's just their fanfiction and headcanons get to become canon. I think for the longest time we only had their treatment of their character on-panel, maybe an interview where they're more candid here or there, to see how these writers feel about these characters and where their bias or nepotism lies, but social media has changed that. Do I think it'll compromise his story or his sales? no, the marketing/hyped going into this are pretty strong, so long as the story is actually as good as people are hoping it'll be and isn't an active smear campaign against Hal, it'll be fine. John fans have been saying for years that X writer or Z writer has no real love for John but we still pick up a good GL story if it's good. the people who'll outrage skip because Throne doesn't worship at the altar of Hal Jordan likely weren't interested in a John story away.

[km_sus]

I understand what you're saying. I'm not naive enough to believe that every creator loves every character they work on. Thankfully, we know this book will focus on John, so it's not a situation where a writer dislikes a character but is forced to write for him. Throne is able to write for a character which he clearly adores, which is best for a quality book. In the end, the GL mythos is large enough to tell a story with room to breathe and exist away from other elements of the GL universe. And it'll be nice to recommend a John book that isn't from 30 years ago.

However, and we'll have to agree to disagree on this one - I still think it's a little strange to gun for a job in the industry while trash talking one if it's major characters and all of the runs he's had publicly.

It obviously worked out in the end though lol, I certainly wouldn't be brave enough to do that.

[j9ac9k]

Hal's my favorite Lantern, but I'm more put off by the Raney's preview art. I was never the biggest fan of his (I've always thought he makes men look a bit ...beastly), but he seems to have regressed from the pages they put out. Just not for me - to the point where the story is going to have to really make up for it.

[Redjack]

This guy is a bit too dramatic, but he screnshoted lots of new writers tweets over the last few years here: https://twitter.com/han9002/status/1...709736960?s=21

He basically thinks that Hal is a boring cardboard character and only time he was interesting was when he was bad guy (for his favourite GLs to beat obviously). Likely that some Hal fans won't give his book a chance.

i'm not going to keep doing this but, once again, NO ONE is going after Hal. There is no hatchet over his head.

I can't say it more plainly than that.

I'm a professional. If the internet didn't exist, you guys wouldn't even think about this nonsense when reading the book.

DC Comics isn't getting rid of Hal Jordan. Ever. Like, seriously. Never, ever. Are people actually this crazy?

I am not gunning for Hal Jordan. There are no targets on his back.

Believe me. Don't believe me. But you can't say you weren't told.

[j9ac9k]

Believe me. Don't believe me. But you can't say you weren't told.

People are going to express their thoughts and fears - the internet does exist and while I appreciate you trying to reassure people, nobody can control how people react or choose to express themselves on the internet. Also, if you had told people DC was bringing back Wally West in a huge event title heralding the "return of hope and legacies" just to turn him into a mass-murderer cover-upperer, they'd have thought you were the crazy one, y'know? Fandom didn't get this paranoid for no reason -like John Stewart fans. Or are they crazy too?

[Redjack]

People are going to express their thoughts and fears - the internet does exist and while I appreciate you trying to reassure people, nobody can control how people react or choose to express themselves on the internet. Also, if you had told people DC was bringing back Wally West in a huge event title heralding the "return of hope and legacies" just to turn him into a mass-murderer cover-upperer, they'd have thought you were the crazy one, y'know? Fandom didn't get this paranoid for no reason -like John Stewart fans. Or are they crazy too?

dc comics will never, never ever kill off Hal Jordan.

never.

there is reasonable fear and there is paranoia.

like I said. believe or not.

i never lie.