This Is It People – Geoff Johns Leaves Green Lantern

We all knew this day was coming. Geoff Johns can’t write Green Lantern forever, though he probably would if he could. One day Johns was going to move on to new things and leave Green Lantern to finally sink or swim without its long time master. He’s been writing about Hal Jordan and the intergalactic police department for nine years now and in that time so many new ideas have been introduced and old concepts have been revamped.

Johns introduced the emotional spectrum, the Black Lantern Corps, made the Guardians into villains, and unearthed secret after secret of hidden Green Lantern Corps past. We can only imagine at this point what is ahead for Hal Jordan, Kyle Rayner, Guy Gardner, John Stewart and maybe even Simon Baz. But what will happen to Johns’ many creations and even the characters he saved from oblivion? I imagine the characters in other Green Lantern titles will continue unscathed. Atrocitus will continue to appear in Red Lanterns, Saint Walker will play an important role in Green Lantern: New Guardians, Larfleeze will be hanging out in Threshold. These ideas have long since taken on a life of their own beyond their creator. Geoff Johns or not, these stories can only continue to go in new directions and even higher heights.

Green Lantern was a dead brand before Johns came along. Hal Jordan had long since gone crazy and destroy the Green Lantern Corps and now Kyle Rayner was all that was left. Rayner kept the light burning for years, both in story and property, but only Hal Jordan’s return could usher in the sweeping changes that needed to take place. It was not always the best writing, but it was exactly what the brand needed. Now the line is a juggernaut with infinite possibilities and we need to thank Geoff Johns for that.

Why All the Death?

People die. It happens. But why can legacies only be passed along after death? The old hero dies and a new one rises to take their place. It happens all the time, but what’s wrong with doing it a little differently? Why can’t the old hero just move on? Super-heroics is a dangerous business and people will ultimately die, but is it impossible to simply retire, to live? How does killing the hero do anything but hurt the franchise?

Barry Allen died so that Wally West could become the Flash, Ted Kord was murdered and Jaime Reyes replaced him as Blue Beetle, (almost) every single character ever named Manhunter was killed so that Kate Spencer could step up to be the brand new Manhunter. This goes beyond just legacy characters too. It seems that in order to introduce a new concept, you must first destroy an old one. Ed Brubaker brought Bucky back from the dead as the Winter Soldier, but in the process he kills off Jack Monroe, the hero known as Nomad. Obviously, not many people cared one way or the other about Nomad, but now that character is off the board forever (I highly doubt anyone will be attempting to resurrect him, ever). Whatever potential he may have had in the future is now gone. Scott Lang, the second Ant-Man was brought back to life during Avengers: The Children’s Crusade, but then his daughter, Stature, and Vision are killed in the same series. Creators often talk about world building, but too often the elimination of characters are used to launch that idea of world building at the reader. It seems that in order to build you must first destroy.

10 Things to Learn from the March DC Comics Solicitations

The March solicitations for DC Comics have been released. Check it out. Here are my thoughts about what we’ve been shown this month.

1. Reintroductions. Several titles for the month of March focus on the reintroduction and reinterpretation of old characters from the pre-New 52 era. Some of the seem to be All New All Different and other look to be about the same. Still, they say they’re brand new, so maybe we’re still missing something.

The H.I.V.E. has traditionally been an enemy of the Teen Titans, however it appears to be focusing on Metropolis and therefore will come to blows with Superman. The H.I.V.E. has been subject to several changes to its core concept over the many years. It was originally a group of unnamed villains brought together to fight the Teen Titans, then it became a much bigger organization, until finally being taken over by the Queen Bee and becoming her actual ‘hive’. Time will tell how the group will be portrayed here. It could be something completely new.

Zealot will be joining Stormwatch in issue #18 and she appears to be creating problems for the group’s dynamic duo of Apollo and Midnighter. Zealot is a Kherubim, an alien race that has been at war with the Daemonites for thousands of years. If the conflict between these two races is still canon I think it’s likely that DC is building up to the introduction of the Wildcats. Grifter is now without a title and now that Spartan and possibly something to do with Mr. Majestic are being introduced in February, I think once Zealot plays her part in Stormwatch she could be showing up elsewhere.

Discussion: What’s Wrong with the New 52?

We decided to discuss what we felt was wrong about DC Comics’ New 52 and compare it to Marvel NOW! We talk about costumes, Jack Kirby, Superman, Spider-Man, Hulk, Daredevil and a lot more.

Jason: There’s nothing interesting happening in the New DCU. It’s all just repetition of old comics and stories we’ve already seen.

Superman looks like he’s wearing a big blue diaper now

Johnnie: Yeah, that was my impression as well. I mean, ideally the New 52 was designed to bring in new readers. But what they’re doing with it is so uninteresting to me, I just didn’t bother with 99% of the revamp. The only one I’ve gotten into is Batman. And even then I was already interested in reading Batman. Plus those costumes. My God.

Jason: We could write an entire book about why every costume in the New 52 is absolutely horrible. Superman has so many lines going all over his body that it’s hard to know what to look at. It’s like they tried so hard to make the costumes look ‘real’ that they look so unbelievably overdrawn and unrealistic.

Johnnie: Yeah, I think Superman is probably the worst offender I’ve seen. But it goes beyond just those totally unnecessary, goofy lines. His suit is also not like, cloth. It’s this weird alien technology. Like, I don’t even know how to describe it. What is it exactly?

Jason: It’s some kind of technology that materializes when he wants it to. No more itchy costume under his business attire. He can just rip off his shirt and mentally command his suit to materialize! It’s so necessary!

10 Things to be Learned from DC Comics’ February Solicitations

DC Comics released their solicitations for February 2013 and now we know what the DC Universe will be like in three months time. It’s given us clues as to what will be happening soon as well as down the road. There’s plenty of guesswork, but it’s all we can really do.

1. Justice League Expansion? The solicits for Justice League #17 mentions the possibility of the Justice League finally expanding its roster. While it might not be right away, it still could be happening in the very near future. Maybe we’ll finally see the likes of Firestorm, Atom, Deadman, Element Girl, Mera and Lady Luck(?) We were told would join the Justice League eventually.

The odd part about this is the inclusion of Hawkman and Green Arrow in this picture. The two will soon be appearing in Justice League of America and this picture was released before that title was even in a twinkle in Geoff Johns eye. It’s pretty obvious that the title was not something they had on their schedule at that point, since Justice League International was supposed to be the ‘other’ Justice League team. Then again, Deadman is there and he’s been in Justice League Dark since the beginning, so maybe I should be giving them more credit.

Review – JLA/JSA: Virtue and Vice

All the Justice

4 out of 5 stars
DC Comics
David S. Goyer/Geoff Johns – Writers
Carlos Pacheco – Penciler
Jesus Merino – Inker
Guy Major – Colorist

Virtue and Vice is your elevator into the DC Universe, if that elevator suddenly went into a freefall and dropped you down into the sub-basement. It is a perfect sample of what the DCU can offer and is a great introduction into the Justice League of America and the Justice Society of America. There are no origin stories, no hard hitting narratives; instead, Goyer and Johns cut out a healthy slice of continuity and offer it up as an appetizer to impress you.

The heroes here are not iconic, but current (2002 current). Unless you’re a DC Universe continuity cop, you probably won’t be familiar with everything. Nothing is explained to the reader up front, but rather through the progression of the story answers can be found. It’s not outright confusing, but you just have to deal with the fact that Wally West is the Flash, Kyle Rayner is the one and only Green Lantern, JLA headquarters is on the moon and Lex Luthor is President (yes, that was a thing that happened). Several references are made to previous stories that took place in each teams’ ongoing series, JLA and JSA, but an unfamiliar reader can simply pass that off as ‘casual’ conversation.