Green Lantern Rebirth

Posted on February 8, 2010 by Mark

I think I know quite a bit about Marvel Comics, by which I mean your Spiderman and X-Men and other characters. However I don’t know much about DC comics so in recent years I have picked up odd books to try and get into that world. I read a well reviewed Superman trade, another recommended modern Superman origin story, and a Power Girl book. I have to say that none of them blew me away but of all the Power Girl book seemed the most clever as it took a very muddled and confused set of ideas and created an excellent clean slate. There is something about Superman, or at least the books I have read, that just doesn’t make me care about him. Maybe its the preconceived premise that he’s indestructible, at least with Spiderman he has to consider that he might not make it out alive even if you know he always will.

However this year I decided to follow up on my attempt to get into DC by picking up some Green Lantern books which are currently getting very good press. Rather than jump in right now I decided to step back a bit to an accepted jumping on point. I choose to start with Green Lantern: Rebirth. This story was set to take Hal Jordan and bring him back from the very controversial place he had been taken, to put it mildly fans were pretty much agreed that the character had been totally screwed over and destroyed.

The book opens with Hal Jordan (space cop with a magical power ring) still possessed by a malevolent force that set him on his controversial path of destruction. Over the course of the book his fellow Green Lanterns succumb to a similar evil force, as Hal’s decline is revealed not to be entirely his own fault. As events unfold Hal’s arch-enemy and former mentor Sinestro is released and an epic battle ensues. At the critical moment the lanterns are able to fight back and Jordan is redeemed. The book is a massive space battle punctuated by flashbacks to Hal’s early life which seek to reveal the fear that led him to fall from grace.

Overall though I didn’t like this book. Whilst I could pick up a lot I felt that to get the most out of this book you did need to know who each of Earth’s three Lanterns were and where they come from character wise. It got very confusing when they all showed up. I thought the main plot was good but I didn’t engage with any of the characters and got bored of the battles. That said I did enjoy the tiny part of the story that involves Batman and how he doesn’t like Jordan because he can’t intimidate him. There was also just enough Green Arrow in here to make me think about picking up one of his books next. The art was very nice but I can’t say there is anything in there that I would want the original page for. I have bought and read the next trade and will let you know how that went soon.