Comics are Awesome III

[andersonh1]

Green Lantern Knight Terrors #1 - I think these crossover tie-in issues take the place of the regular series for a couple of months, so I picked this up. And it's essentially the next issue of the series, picking up right where GL #2 left off. I wouldn't say that it's that good, the story is about a villain that attacks people in their dreams, so nothing that happens to Hal in this book is real, though I suppose the effects on him can be. I'm not a fan of the "it was all a dream" type of plot, but that's what this entire "event" apparently is. That being said, there are some interesting ideas in the book, including a nightmare where Hal takes the ring from Abin Sur and it is essentially parasitic, and Hal feeling like he betrayed his oath as a GL when he quit rather than work for the United Planets. After being on his heels for most of the issue he steps up and becomes the confident in the face of disaster Hal Jordan he usually is, with the cliffhanger showing him attacked by the Parallax entity. There's also a short backup about Sinestro, who is stranded on Earth without his ring, for reasons we don't yet know. So it's an issue that doesn't entirely abandon current plot threads in favor of the event crossover.

[andersonh1]

Sparky, did you see this? I found this over on the Collected Editions message board. I might have to pick this up. I had been buying some of the Kyle Rayner back issues a few months back since I never read most of them, but this might be a better way to read them if it sells and we get further volumes.

[andersonh1]

Today's comics:

Knight Terrors: Shazam #1 - I bought Knight Terrors Green Lantern because it was taking the place of the regular issues for a couple of months, so I did the same for Shazam. Both tie-ins are written by the regular writer of the main series, Mark Waid in the case of Shazam. But I can see now that every one of these tie-in issues is likely to be exactly the same story, as the villain of Knight Terrors makes the main character live through their worse fears. So it's bound to get repetitive, and two issues of something that isn't actually happening doesn't make for the most compelling reading. On the positive side, Mary Marvel gets to keep her classic name, unlike "the Captain". Her biggest fear is apparently Billy going bad and not only stealing the Shazam power from her, but killing all the foster siblings with the magic lightning.

World's Finest #17 - Wraps up "Elementary" story by answering the question of how the heroes can defeat a new and improved Amazo, who gets stronger and stronger as he steals the powers of the heroes. The answer is by sending the original Amazo to attack him, so the two of them keeping absorbing each other's power levels in an ever-increasing loop until they are both destroyed. That's pretty clever, and a fair way to beat an otherwise unbeatable villain.

[Sparky Prime]

Sparky, did you see this? I found this over on the Collected Editions message board. I might have to pick this up. I had been buying some of the Kyle Rayner back issues a few months back since I never read most of them, but this might be a better way to read them if it sells and we get further volumes.

I hadn't. I'd gotten a great deal of Kyle Rayner's back issues a while back as well. It'd be nice more of his stories getting collected... He seems to be the Green Lantern most ignored these days, which is a shame.

[andersonh1]

Knight Terrors Green Lantern #2 - Seems to me like a creature who digs up fears in someone's psyche and weaponizes them isn't going to fare too well against a Green Lantern, so it's not hard to guess that Hal will turn around and clean house this issue, which indeed he does. We get to see both the yellow bug Parallax and Hal as Parallax, neither of which can do much more than run from Hal. We go through the nightmares of last issue in reverse order as Hal shuts down the false Abin Sur and then uses a ring created chainsaw to destroy the illusions of his family at his dad's funeral. Jeremy Adams never quite gets Hal's "voice", not here or in the main series (which this is essentially an issue of), but it's close enough. Hal defeats the main villain of the Knight Terrors crossover and wakes up, taking control of the Ferris Air jet to get it to safety.

Sinestro's backup story is more mental imagery exposing his fears, and interestingly we get a few scenes with Soranik, and though this isn't the real character, it's nice to see that she hasn't been forgotten. As far as I know, we last saw her in Venditti's Hal Jordan and the Green Lantern Corps series. No idea what's become of her. The story ends so abruptly I thought I'd missed a page, but no. In the end, Sinestro wakes up and is back to being his old self, apparently.

So this whole crossover, what few issues I've read, just doesn't appeal to me, because nothing that happens in these issues is real. There's only so many times we can wander through a character's induced nightmares before being ready to get back to the real world. I guess the value for me of these issues is seeing some of Hal's history brought up for readers who might not be familiar, or who had forgotten some of it. But I'll be ready to get back to the regular series and the main plot after this diversion.

[andersonh1]

Green Lantern #3 - The book opens flashing back to when Hal's ring cuts out and he's falling to his death, though he manages to get it working again before he hits the ground. The sequence is one of the first I've seen that correctly notes that Hal is not using his original ring, the one that Abin Sur gave him, and that it could do things that later rings could not. In the present day, Sinestro, wearing jeans, a jacket and a hoodie and still without his ring, is recruiting help for some unstated goals from aliens living in disguise on Earth. He attacks Ferris Air. Hal as GL is playing baseball with some neighborhood kids while Kilowog cheers them on. Carol calls him in and shows him security footage of Sinestro's attack, speculating that he did it just to attract Hal's attention. And sure enough, Sinestro finds Hal sitting in the bar, as Hal is thinking of what Sinestro did to someone. We still don't know who, though we've had lots of hints.

The John Stewart backup story has the alternate universe's John Stewart attacking the Revenant Queen, who escapes into the multiverse to fight another day. John sends the surviving Lantern to track her down and make contact with that universe's John Stewart... who is sitting on his porch, having a virtual beer with a ring projection of Guy Gardner. Guy would love for John to get back into the field, but John needs to spend some time on Earth helping his mother and family.

I'm curious about the various mysteries that the series has set up, but I hope we don't have to wait forever for some answers. The book is definitely trying to call back to the Silver and Bronze Ages when it comes to some story elements, including the ring and Hal's uniform. And I never thought I'd be happy to see Guy again, but I've missed seeing him and Kyle on a regular basis. At least we know Guy's alright and still out in space with the Corps.

[andersonh1]

World's Finest #19 - part 2 of this book's "first" Batman/Superman team-up. This series follows a pattern of the main storylines being drawn by the regular artist, and then we get a one or two issue fill in with a different artist. In this case Superman's fellow Kryptonian Jax-Ur has escaped from the Phantom Zone, and it takes Batman and Superman working together to stop him and get him back there. The Riddler get the cover, but he plays a very minor role at the beginning and end of the story. Next issue: Waid revisits the Kingdom Come story setting.

Green Lantern War Journal #1 - I guess it's fair to say that a combination of the backup stories in the main GL title and just wanting more information on the current status quo motivated me to pick up this issue, which is pretty good. The Revenant Queen finds a new host in the main DC universe, while our John Stewart is finding post-Corps life slow and hard to adjust to. He and Hal are in the same boat in some ways. John is living with his mother, who seems to be in the early stages of dementia. A United Planets Green Lantern comes to arrest John for supposed unauthorized possession of a power ring, but John has internalized power now (must have happened during the Thorne run) and makes short work of this GL, who he berates for giving up so quickly, booting him from Earth. Pretty good art and story, and while I was on the fence about buying this book, I think I'll stick with it for now.

[Sparky Prime]

A United Planets Green Lantern comes to arrest John for supposed unauthorized possession of a power ring, but John has internalized power now (must have happened during the Thorne run) and makes short work of this GL, who he berates for giving up so quickly, booting him from Earth.

I haven't been following GL, but last I recall they were already dropping the Emerald Knight stuff, right? So this internalized power is something else?

[andersonh1]

A United Planets Green Lantern comes to arrest John for supposed unauthorized possession of a power ring, but John has internalized power now (must have happened during the Thorne run) and makes short work of this GL, who he berates for giving up so quickly, booting him from Earth.

I haven't been following GL, but last I recall they were already dropping the Emerald Knight stuff, right? So this internalized power is something else?

I'm not sure, so I hope they explain it at some point.

[andersonh1]

Green Arrow #4 - I bought this issue because Convergence Parallax is in it. I don't think we've seen him since Venditti was writing Green Lantern back at the end of the New 52, during Hal's "Renegade" phase. The opening pages make it clear that all the Hard-Traveling heroes, Reign of the Superman and Zero Hour stories are still in continuity as Ollie remembers shooting Hal at the end of Zero Hour. Final Night and Parallax resurrecting Ollie are also referenced. I haven't been following the series, but apparently Oliver Queen is separated from Roy and Dinah and is in the 31st century with the Legion of Super Heroes, and he wants help from Parallax to get home. Ollie being the belligerent person that he is loses patience with Parallax and gets in a fist fight with him. That brings out the parasite version briefly, or at least the distorted version of Hal with the teeth and the throat, before he just leaves Ollie alone wherever he is. It's hard to comment on chapter four of what is presumably a six part story, and I'd have been more interested in conversation between Oliver and Parallax than in them fighting. There's not a lot here, honestly, but if nothing else it's good to see that Convergence Parallax hasn't been forgotten by everyone. I think it would be more interesting if we never saw the fear parasite (even though people know about it of course) and they just wrote Hal/Parallax in the same way he was written in the 90s. I think there was some story potential that went to waste here.