Friday, July 31, 2009

Green Lantern Part 2

Okay, the issues started picking up after issue 98 or so. I may keep them from that point on. The art especially picks up. But the writing is still not great. They have a series of issues where Kyle's girlfriend Jade is Green Lantern for a bit and they do a story on her coming across a guy who tried to sexually abuse her as a child. The writing was okay, a little heavy-handed but okay, I appreciated that he was trying to tackle a tough subject. But Jade is drawn throughout the issue as a tarted up sex object which mixes the message more than a little. I mean, they have a full page picture of her looking over her shoulder and sticking her butt out at her would-be molester (she kidnaps him and ties him up and threatens to kill him) which just made no sense to me. And if memory serves, a few issues ahead Kyle gets a gay assistant after saving him from a beating. But he serves no purpose to any of the long running plots or to Kyle as anything other than a token gay character so DC can claim diversity. I think the writer, Ron Marz, really tried to make Green Lantern a character driven comic, but he did so as someone who doesn't know how to create interesting characters. I mean, I like Green Lantern because of the costume, the ring and he goes to outer space a lot. Do good adventure stories based on those 3 concepts and I'm happy. But through most of his run Marz did very few of those things. Yes the costume and powers were there, but there are at least 3 "I'm breaking up with my girlfriend issues" where the formulaic break-up conversation takes up at least half the comic. Which would be find if there were anything interesting about it to begin with, but there isn't. The villains have no background and no personality, and in one issue, after defeating russian arms dealers, and restraining ALL of them, he then sinks their massive cargo tanker boat in the middle of a busy New York harbor for no apparent reason, and flies off declaring how the authorities are just going to have to deal with this mess because he has a date. It's just so dumb. What was I thinking when I bought these?

Edited to add in:

This article on the inconsistency of Green Lantern comics is pretty good if you're at all interested (he said, knowing he was the only one interested). Basically no one has known what to do with the character long term and he's been constantly and consistently revamped to revitalize sales. Reading it kind of exhausts me. Comics and their fans exhaust me. I think I'm just going to stick with trades mostly from now on, so I can pick and choose the good stuff.

Oh, and reading that article reminded me, I only ever really liked GL as he was written in JLA, starting with Grant Morrison. If anyone is at all interested in GL, I recommend starting there.

Wednesday, July 29, 2009

Betrayed by Green Lantern

I've been needing a pick-me-up recently, so I picked up my Green Lantern comic collection, and started reading through it, as a prelude to buying the trades of the most recent issues which I hear are really good. You can imagine my dismay as I read through them and find I don't like them at all. I still like the character, the costume design, the powers, the universe, but the stories that I have are just awful. I've read good superhero comics and these aren't them. I'm through 60 issues now, and there's been maybe 3 that were tolerable. It's been fairly horrifying for me, and I must share the pain.

img028

This is from the Emerald Twilight trade where Hal Jordan goes crazy and destroys the Corps. The first issue is not great, it's a depiction of him going crazy after his home city is destroyed, and it's not a great read but mostly tolerable, but it has this odd moment (shown above) where Hal is talking to an illusion of his first girlfriend, and for some inexplicable reason, while wearing tights that leave nothing to the imagination mind you, talks to her casually while thrusting his groin into her hands, as you can see. This is probably the worst of it, but the Hal Jordan stuff I have is full of hokey and weird moments like this. And the story writing is terrible. Just awful.

img029

Enter Kyle Raynor. I remember liking him. So again I find myself horrified at his issues. He's awful. He's stupid and sexist and not interesting. The author makes a valiant stab at trying to make it a more character driven series, but good lord does he miss the mark. I'm really starting to like character driven stories, but this writer just does not pull it off. And then I get to scenes like the one above and just want to start banging my head against a wall. I suppose there is inherent humor value in giving a guy a power ring that responds to his imagination, and having it accidentally generate sexual imagery, but that's not really what they do. And reading the above just made me go "Ick" and immediately dislike the character. I suppose it might have been tolerable if the dialogue, plotting, villains, and characters were in any way compelling, but they're not. I mean, shortly after this issue he fights a tiger in a zoo and nearly LOSES. Deep sigh.

Anyway, I think the truth is, I'm just not who I was when I bought these comics when I was younger. I'm going to finish reading these and keep the issues that I might actually consider reading again, but I think the rest I'm going to sell. And thinking over most of my collection, I think I'm going to sell a lot of that too. Of course, I'm really lazy about it, if any of my real life friends want to sell them for me, I'll split the proceeds 50/50. In any case, it is liberating and disturbing to find that so much of the crap I lug around I flat out don't like anymore. But losing Green Lantern, man that hurts.

Monday, July 13, 2009

Just another Monday

I spent my early afternoon at the doctor's office, trying and failing not to get a partial erection while a male and female doctor fiddled with my junk and then they had me pee in a cup. Good times.

Wait, is this blog connected to the internet? Where anyone can read it? Wait! Don't hit po