Alan Scott: The Green Lantern by Tim Sheridan and Cian Tormey (New Golden Age)

[andersonh1]

a more interesting Alan.

That's a matter of opinion.

[j9ac9k]

That's a matter of opinion.

Of course that's an opinion. Did you really need to call that out?

[andersonh1]

I suspect the 1970's scene in the new JSA book was strong support for that. As for today, Dataweaver has a theory that the Golden Age folks dealt with COIE in their 1985 and when the crisis was over got dumped back on Earth with the modern era heroes in whatever year COIE happened for them (15 yrs ago or so). The Infinitors as well as some supporting cast could be time jumped as well.

I think if they're going to keep the Golden Age characters tied to WW2 that they're going to have to eventually give them the Captain America treatment and have them skip a lot of the intervening years somehow. Although at the moment having a few century-old superheroes around is an idea that deserves some exploration before it's shelved.

[Jon Clark]

Like i said, just jetison Infinity Inc (nit the characters like Jade, Obsidian, and Atom-Smasher) rather than get into convoluted stuff to include 1980's stories that will be unrecognizable thanks to retcon upon retcon.

I'd prefer somehow including these stories but only if they actually work. If we have Power Girl's role in the first 12 issues revolving around her cousin who no longer exists (Same with Fury and Huntress) then what is really left to save by trying to keep the story?

[Refrax5]

I would say that Alan Scott is fundamentally the character most ill suited to reconnecting as a closeted gay man, precisely because his fundamental character traits are honesty, fearlessness and willpower. But if he was afraid to be honest about who he was with his friends and family and wives, doesn't that make him less brave than before? Less honest? It seems like it to me. So yes, this changes more than superficial character traits. He's going to an asylum for goodness sake... Is that something you could ever picture the old Alan doing? I couldn't.

I thought honest and fearless were the required traits for Green Lanterns introduced in the Silver Age. It was only Hal and his successors that were said to be "honest and fearless" as I recall.

[CaptCleghorn]

I think if they're going to keep the Golden Age characters tied to WW2 that they're going to have to eventually give them the Captain America treatment and have them skip a lot of the intervening years somehow. Although at the moment having a few century-old superheroes around is an idea that deserves some exploration before it's shelved.

I doubt DC is ever going to move the JSA from the WW2 era to an X years ago timeframe. I prefer that because it fixes the background of the JSA as opposed to reimagining them as having come to age in the 60s or the 80s. Plus the boomer personalities can be a nice contrast to whatever the current day attitudes are like.

Like i said, just jetison Infinity Inc (nit the characters like Jade, Obsidian, and Atom-Smasher) rather than get into convoluted stuff to include 1980's stories that will be unrecognizable thanks to retcon upon retcon.

I'd prefer somehow including these stories but only if they actually work. If we have Power Girl's role in the first 12 issues revolving around her cousin who no longer exists (Same with Fury and Huntress) then what is really left to save by trying to keep the story?

If it was just the JSA, it would be simple to have most of them killed off by now and just the few long lived members around. But they have kids and other connections. While characters like Stargirl, Black Canary, Jack Knight, and the Infinitors could have their histories rewritten, it's messy for a company who, frankly, has their history sketched out on a white board with random writers walking in constantly with dry erase markers.

[Ascended]

Alan's marriages and offspring are complicated by two major issues. The first is his retconned sexuality. The second is the increasing amount of time that has passed. Coming up with a reason that a gay man fathers children is easier than coming up with even a comic book explanation of how people born over 100 years ago can be parents to people in their mid twenties.

The time skip is by far a bigger hurdle. A gay man in the closet having kids? Yeah, that's still happening *today* and isn't hard to write around; for all the progress we've made on LBGT acceptance, there's still a sizeable chunk of bigots out there and a lot of folks still stay in the closet (at least halfway) just to avoid the bullshit.

But Alan being an adult in the 1940's, and his kids currently only being 20-something (maybe early 30's by this point, if they're still as old as the adult Titans should be?) is a much bigger problem. You either have to pull the whole family into the time skip, or spit the JSA out in the 80's/90's and have them start families then. Either way adds weird complications.

[The Darknight Detective]

The time skip is by far a bigger hurdle. A gay man in the closet having kids? Yeah, that's still happening *today* and isn't hard to write around; for all the progress we've made on LBGT acceptance, there's still a sizeable chunk of bigots out there and a lot of folks still stay in the closet (at least halfway) just to avoid the bullshit.

But Alan being an adult in the 1940's, and his kids currently only being 20-something (maybe early 30's by this point, if they're still as old as the adult Titans should be?) is a much bigger problem. You either have to pull the whole family into the time skip, or spit the JSA out in the 80's/90's and have them start families then. Either way adds weird complications.

Agreed. Alan's revised sexuality and family life isn't that difficult to handle at all, but the time skip is going to need a massive amount of IQ lowering on the part of the reader to keep it afloat.

[Ascended]

Agreed. Alan's revised sexuality and family life isn't that difficult to handle at all, but the time skip is going to need a massive amount of IQ lowering on the part of the reader to keep it afloat.

I think if you just hit on the right contrivance, you're good. Like Captain America being frozen in the ocean for X number of years. It's an easy solution that isn't affected by the length of the time jump; Cap can be frozen for decades or for centuries and the end result is the same; he wakes up in the modern day to a world he barely recognizes. If DC can find the right justification for the JSA and their families being time-lost, then it should make as much sense as anything else in comics. The problem is, what kind of 'simple explanation' happenstance removes all those people and what brings them back?

[The Darknight Detective]

I think if you just hit on the right contrivance, you're good. Like Captain America being frozen in the ocean for X number of years. It's an easy solution that isn't affected by the length of the time jump; Cap can be frozen for decades or for centuries and the end result is the same; he wakes up in the modern day to a world he barely recognizes. If DC can find the right justification for the JSA and their families being time-lost, then it should make as much sense as anything else in comics. The problem is, what kind of 'simple explanation' happenstance removes all those people and what brings them back?

But they have to figure out 1) how to bring back the JSA, 2) their supporting cast/family, and 3) a passable explanation for young children. Good luck with that!

[thwhtGuardian]

Agreed. Alan's revised sexuality and family life isn't that difficult to handle at all, but the time skip is going to need a massive amount of IQ lowering on the part of the reader to keep it afloat.

Yeah, I've never had a problem with trapped in another dimension or time radiation exposure explanations for the heroes themselves but when you extend it to their families and extended cast it begins to be a bit much.

[The Darknight Detective]

Yeah, I've never had a problem with trapped in another dimension or time radiation exposure explanations for the heroes themselves but when you extend it to their families and extended cast it begins to be a bit much.

Now if they all had been on another Earth at some gathering and somehow (magically or scientifically by some supervillain) wound up on the Earth with the present-day Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, etc., then you could make it plausible. The Golden Age superheroes could be only middle-aged instead of ancient, so having twenty-something children would be more than acceptable. You could have all that mentoring and what not that some point to as to why Clutter Earth is so much better than the Multiverse, too (no eye-rolling emoji to insert here, but you get the message ).

[thwhtGuardian]

Now if they all had been on another Earth at some gathering and somehow (magically or scientifically by some supervillain) wound up on the Earth with the present-day Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, etc., then you could make it plausible. The Golden Age superheroes could be only middle-aged instead of ancient, so having twenty-something children would be more than acceptable. You could have all that mentoring and what not that some point to as to why Clutter Earth is so much better than the Multiverse, too (no eye-rolling emoji to insert here, but you get the message ).

Personally, I think the easiest way is just to use a sliding time scale and ditch the idea that people thought Superman was the first super hero. So then you have the JSA heroes operating in late 70's and 80's, retiring and raising families who in the current time are just coming of age.

Heck, if you wanted to keep some of the novelty of characters like Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman showing up you could just say that super heroes were banned in the early 90's and that there weren't many vigilantes until the trinity shows up "now" and it would still work.

[Ascended]

Now if they all had been on another Earth at some gathering and somehow (magically or scientifically by some supervillain) wound up on the Earth with the present-day Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, etc., then you could make it plausible. The Golden Age superheroes could be only middle-aged instead of ancient, so having twenty-something children would be more than acceptable. You could have all that mentoring and what not that some point to as to why Clutter Earth is so much better than the Multiverse, too (no eye-rolling emoji to insert here, but you get the message ).

Pulling them all from earth-2 during the Crisis seems like a viable idea. As their world dies the JSA grab their spouses and kids and head to earth-1. Basically gives the entire team Power Girl's origin, but it solves a bunch of problems. No need to worry about the time scale or bend over backwards to justify why everyone's still around.

It ties their arrival on clutter earth to the biggest event in DC history (I do love my meta). It allows the 'main earth' heroes to retain their original origins, with Clark being the first and Barry being inspired by old JayFlash comic books, etc. It explains why Alan is a Green Lantern but not really.

I dunno if it's a direction I'd actually want to see DC go in, but I think it's a viable option.

But honestly, you could probably just say Per Degaton or somebody attacked a JSA/Infinity Inc picnic, or a holiday party or something, and threw everyone into the future. That'd explain why all the wives and kids were included.

[Godzilla2099]

The time skip is by far a bigger hurdle. A gay man in the closet having kids? Yeah, that's still happening *today* and isn't hard to write around; for all the progress we've made on LBGT acceptance, there's still a sizeable chunk of bigots out there and a lot of folks still stay in the closet (at least halfway) just to avoid the bullshit.

But Alan being an adult in the 1940's, and his kids currently only being 20-something (maybe early 30's by this point, if they're still as old as the adult Titans should be?) is a much bigger problem. You either have to pull the whole family into the time skip, or spit the JSA out in the 80's/90's and have them start families then. Either way adds weird complications.

I have friends, coworkers and family that are gay. Zero problems and none of my business. All of the couples I know except one includes a partner from a previous marriage and has kids (I'm in my 40s)

But as soon as I saw the who was writing the book and the title of it, my knee jerk reaction was "This probably won't be a Superhero Book, its another LGBTQ Focus Story"

I think the problem many fans have including myself what Tim Sheridan is doing is taking 80+ years of Alan Scott's History and flushing it down the toilet so he can tell a story he wants. I loved having a group of superheroes coming together to form the Justice Society of America to make the world a better place. Its such a great Golden Age Story. Instead, Sheridan feeds us this bullcrap that J Edgar Hoover persecuting Scott and forcing him into this team as American Propaganda.

But instead of reading my feedback, of course the knee jerk response from this writer is, "If you don't like this, then you're a homophobe!"