Hal Jordan: The Green Lantern Appreciation 2024

[Vordan]

I've read that their stories are going to coincide at some point, but will it be "an event" or just a crossover between the two titles? I don't want to get my hopes up.

I’m thinking it will be like Williamson’s House of Brainiac. The two books crossover but its advertised as an event.

[HsssH]

Didn't PKJ say that he is writing only 12 issues? If there are no delays then #12 will come out in August.

[j9ac9k]

SPOILERS FOR GL #9
-- The more this series goes on, the less enthused I am by Adams's writing. It's a lot of stuff "happening" - the illusion of change that mostly doesn't actually mean anything or have any real payoff. Hal's new ring? Just a temp and after months of wondering, it's replaced by a new ring anyway. There's no story other than a mystery that went nowhere. If Hal had started off the series with his normal ring, and we took out all this "new ring" stuff, would we have lost anything other than wondering what the deal was with his new ring? It's like months of theorizing that Kilowog was just a construct. Well, he was and he's dead and once that was revealed... nothing. That was it. Construct gone, lame death scene that nobody buys (explosion, no body) and we just move on. There wasn't even any real emotional catharsis or development for Hal that informs his character or leads to anything. I have a feeling all these new rings for the other earth GL's will be the same - it'll be a "development" that doesn't change anything - they'll just have new rings, same as the old rings essentially. Then Tom's here, the "Last of the New Guardians??" (why not contact Hal directly to uncover this new CPB?) What does any of that have to do with The Green other than being green? Then Tom just walks off. (Geez Hal, at least you could've dropped him off) Same with the UP Lanterns (so far anyway) - I said this last month, but other than changing color, does it really add anything to the story? It's still a bunch of bad guy Lanterns making constructs. So far, the head UP guy is a stock villain. Hopefully he'll become interesting, but so far he makes almost no impression other than being a weak Trump copy - demanding loyalty to him personally.
-- Then there's the bad irony of the UP guy being Trump-like, yet Adams is writing in canonically "earth first" human exceptionalism with this new CPB and the notion of a "core Corps." Man, I hate that so much. (more than I hated "The Four Corpsmen" - at least that was a nickname just between themselves rather than the Guardians canonically placing them above all others) Now the earth (human) Lanterns will be the only "good cops" while the rest are "bad cops."
-- Nice to see Jessica again and at least they acknowledged she went yellow for a minute, but it only highlighted how DC doesn't know what to do with her. Minor nitpick: it would've been nice if Jo had a codename the way Jess had "J-Bird."(or is that just a nickname and Jo and Jess became besties off-panel?) They just revealed Jessica was working under cover. They could've kept Jo a mystery for at least until next issue.

[Digifiend]

No they couldn't, that Jessica backup was a one-shot, it's Guy Gardner next issue.

Also, we have a SPOIL tag to hide spoilers.

[j9ac9k]

No they couldn't, that Jessica backup was a one-shot, it's Guy Gardner next issue.

Also, we have a SPOIL tag to hide spoilers.

Either way - we'll be picking up with Jess later, so the reveal could still happen then. Again, it was a nitpick.

And my post says "SPOILERS" at the top for an issue that been released. There's no specific spoilers that can't be avoided if you choose to not read my post. And at a glance nothing's going to jump out at anyone like "I can't believe they killed Hal!!!"

[Frontier]

spoilers:

Okay, I don't care what anybody else says, the fact that Adams brought Tom back and let him interact with Hal makes this run an instant win for me. I just wish it didn't seem like he was going back to his family instead of staying in the book on an ongoing basis, but I guess I'd feel bad for his family otherwise. And pulling from the whole "New Guardians" thing from Millennium, unpopular as it was, is a deep pull. I can't count the number of retcons or reasons they've tried to come up with for why there are so many Lanterns from Earth but making it because there's an innate Power Battery lodged into the planet with it's own Ring dispenser is...something. Adams really had to throw in there "we can even add more Earth Lanterns if we need to!" as if we don't already have too many as it is. I guess it also gives Hal more reason to stay on Earth which seems to have been one of the main goals of this run. He also seems to be giving up on Carol, but that will make it all the more significant if Carol ends up following him into space. When you immediately warp into a firefight and get captured...luckily it brings him straight to Jo and the resistance. Sam Humphries writing Jessica Cruz again is great, complete with he ring calling her "J-Bird" again, and Jessica going undercover in the inner circle of the UP GL's is an interesting twist for her. But was the "sniper" Simon?

end of spoilers

[Johnny]

[StarSpangledMan]

SPOILERS FOR GL #9
-- The more this series goes on, the less enthused I am by Adams's writing. It's a lot of stuff "happening" - the illusion of change that mostly doesn't actually mean anything or have any real payoff. Hal's new ring? Just a temp and after months of wondering, it's replaced by a new ring anyway. There's no story other than a mystery that went nowhere. If Hal had started off the series with his normal ring, and we took out all this "new ring" stuff, would we have lost anything other than wondering what the deal was with his new ring? It's like months of theorizing that Kilowog was just a construct. Well, he was and he's dead and once that was revealed... nothing. That was it. Construct gone, lame death scene that nobody buys (explosion, no body) and we just move on. There wasn't even any real emotional catharsis or development for Hal that informs his character or leads to anything. I have a feeling all these new rings for the other earth GL's will be the same - it'll be a "development" that doesn't change anything - they'll just have new rings, same as the old rings essentially. Then Tom's here, the "Last of the New Guardians??" (why not contact Hal directly to uncover this new CPB?) What does any of that have to do with The Green other than being green? Then Tom just walks off. (Geez Hal, at least you could've dropped him off) Same with the UP Lanterns (so far anyway) - I said this last month, but other than changing color, does it really add anything to the story? It's still a bunch of bad guy Lanterns making constructs. So far, the head UP guy is a stock villain. Hopefully he'll become interesting, but so far he makes almost no impression other than being a weak Trump copy - demanding loyalty to him personally.
-- Then there's the bad irony of the UP guy being Trump-like, yet Adams is writing in canonically "earth first" human exceptionalism with this new CPB and the notion of a "core Corps." Man, I hate that so much. (more than I hated "The Four Corpsmen" - at least that was a nickname just between themselves rather than the Guardians canonically placing them above all others) Now the earth (human) Lanterns will be the only "good cops" while the rest are "bad cops."
-- Nice to see Jessica again and at least they acknowledged she went yellow for a minute, but it only highlighted how DC doesn't know what to do with her. Minor nitpick: it would've been nice if Jo had a codename the way Jess had "J-Bird."(or is that just a nickname and Jo and Jess became besties off-panel?) They just revealed Jessica was working under cover. They could've kept Jo a mystery for at least until next issue.

I agree. Unfortunately, the run so far has been things happen with the illusion of depth but when you actually dig into it nothing has any real meaning for the characters (except for Hal finally letting Carol go, my favourite moment in this issue) or worse, furthers the annoying and downright bad aspects of modern GL. It's spectacle over substance but honestly, the spectacle is nothing innovative.

spoilers:

Nice to see Tom again though and for a second there, with the mention of the Green and the limitations beyond the Earth's bounds, I thought Hal's temp ring was essentially drawing from the same source as New 52 Earth 2 Alan's powers.

end of spoilers

[Frontier]

Carol is totally going to follow him into space.

[Johnny]

Carol is totally going to follow him into space.

Would be ironic if her fiance left her because she keeps going into space all the time just like how she always left Hal for the same reason.

[Mantis-Ray]

Hey the Guardians actually did something nice for once.

They may be annoying little bastards, but they aren't completely terrible in the end.

[Frontier]

Hey the Guardians actually did something nice for once.

They may be annoying little bastards, but they aren't completely terrible in the end.

That was almost the least believable thing in the whole issue .

[j9ac9k]

The Guardians seem to have left six rings and there are 7 earth Lanterns. Did they just assume Jo would be in the Far Sector? Does it mean they left that backup Battery between Jess and Jo getting their rings? Did they know John wouldn't need a ring or ... they just happened to leave 6 rings.

[Johnny]

It says it can produce more new rings but it would take more time.

[j9ac9k]

Also of note is that Hal has a new ring and charged from that new CPB, but he has no individual Lantern. I wonder if that will be the new status quo moving forward? Not that it really matters since GLs are rarely shown charging their rings anyway, and the whole "ring ran out of charge so we need to get to the battery" thing stopped being used as a source of drama a long time ago.

Maybe Adams's intent is that no matter what else is going on, Hal will have to always come back to earth to charge up. Now I wonder if the UP Lanterns might stick around so they can take the heat for whatever people's feeling are about police and the Earth Lanterns will just be their own group with their Earth Lantern to distance themselves from that and be more like an independent superhero group. (but they'll get rid of whatsisname in charge, then leave the UP Lanterns in the hands of his successor with a "we won't join you, but we'll be watching" kinda warning)