Review: Green Lantern Corps #35

Or – “Meanwhile, Back At The Space Ranch…”

While Hal Jordan has had his hands full with Red and Blue Lantern issues (and been possessed by rings of both Corps) in sector 666, the rest of the known universe has also been dealing with buildup to the upcoming Blackest Night, and the remaining 7199 Lanterns have likewise been out and about with things to do, but only one book to show for themselves…  Now that I mention it, 7199 to 1 seems to be an unfair ratio of Green Lanterns between the two books.  Hal Jordan must have one hell of an agent.

Previously, on Green Lantern Corps: The Guardians of the Universe put down an insurrection led by their former standard-bearer, the Green Lantern of Korugar, Sinestro.  (But seriously, how smart do you have to be to realize that a guy named Sinestro may have ulterior motives?  One might expect that smart guys like the Guardians coulda seen that comin’.)  Unfortunately, the proliferation of Yellow Lantern rings was just a prelude, as Atrocitus of Ysmault has begun recruiting his own group of Red Lanterns, Larfleeze of the Vega System seems to be in the works with his Orange Lanterns, the Star Sapphires of Zamaron have forged their weapons into Purple Lanterns, and renegade Guardian Ganthet has begun the recruitment of his own army of Blue Lanterns.  I will soon begin a drive to create my own Corps of Clear Lanterns, whose rings will be invisible and whose powers may or may not be completely imaginary.  In any case, Atrocitus has sent some of his crimson-hued light-sources to bust out the master of the canary-colored radiations, presumably as a professional courtesy.  After all, guys who were mocked in grade school tend to group together as adults (thus, Stephen, Rodrigo and I working together.)

The sciencells of Oa are witness to a grave battle as the Green Lantern guard, Voz, fights valiantly against the onslaught of a vicious Red Lantern with a face like a perpendicular Pteranodon.  (You kind of had to be there.)  Kanjar Ro, cosmic coward, cheers for the Red Lantern until it frees a Sinestro Corps member, and CUTS IT’S HEAD OFF WITH HIS MOUTH.  “Kille the Red Lantern, Voz!” cries Ro, switching sides effortlessly.  “Save us from this fiend!”  Heh…  Simultaneously the vault holding the Sinestro Corps power rings bursts open sending little circlets of fear out into the universe again.  Kilowog, Guy Gardner and Kyle Rayner rally the troops, and burst into the brig with rings blazing ready to kick red and/or yellow butts.  Meanwhile, in deep space, Sodam Yat and Arisia gain intel on the situation on his home planet Daxam, finding Mongul’s grip on the planet to be made of solid iron…  or lead.  Whichever is more impressive.  They bust through the Sentry (a planet-sized cobra with a Sinestro ring) and make their way down to the planet.  Arkillo, former drill sergeant of the Sinestro Corps is still stalking around with HIS OWN TONGUE tied around his neck (a souvenir of his run-in with Mongul) metaphorically clanking three bottles on his fingertips and taunting the Daxamites to come out and plaaaaay!

Before they manage to call the natives out, the S.C.’s are devastated by the power of Yat and Arisia (who I believe were also the team who sang “Summer Breeze” back in the heady days of 1977) and Sodam finds that the man behind the rebels is his own father, Senator Yat.  Sodam is angered to find his people cowering in a cavern, and goes into “super-patriotic speechifyin’ mode” (TM 1941, Uncle Sam and The Freedom Fighters) and tells his people it’s time to win one for Lar Gipper.  “All of you are going to fight, and save yourselves or DIE TRYING!”  (That’s not exactly motivational, there, Sodam.)  Speaking of Lanterns and home planets, Korugar’s new Lantern, Soranik Natu, and her partner Princess Iolande have returned home to quell unrest on her own planet.  The Korugarians are angry that Sinestro was not executed in public, but she feels a different method is in order.  “Sinestro will one day face justice, and the legacy of hate and fear that he inspired will only be a distant memory.”  But not until the War of Light and it’s respective tie-ins are competed, and the next big event upon us, mind you.  She sets about dismantling the torture devices that Sinestro used to keep order, when her partner is suddenly taken out.  “Hello, Soranik,” murmurs Sinestro as he emerges from the darkness.  “I want to have a little heart-to-heart between a father and his daughter.”

Gotta say, even thought I saw that one comin’ (wondered about it from day one, actually) it’s still an effective reveal, and doesn’t in itself weaken the character of Sinestro the way I worried it would.  Granted, we’ll see how it all plays out in the long term, but it’s interesting to see a variation on the old argument about nature versus nurture (or even “ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny”) play out.  Hopefully, the cliche about apples and their relative distance from their relative arborial points of origin upon the release of all potential energy in a kinetic fashion isn’t true, at least for Soranik’s sake.  Overall, this issue is good, though the fight in the scincecells suffers a bit from unclear storytelling (partly because of the various bug-eyed-monsters looking a bit similar save for color of Lantern) and Arisia’s eyes are often disturbingly huge.  Still, it’s a nice setup for more “War of Light” stuff, giving depth to the story in Green Lantern last week (as this chaos takes place while the Guardians are off-planet dealing with Larfleeze, presumably soon after the events in that issue.)  The gist of the whole thing, minus fi’ dolla’ words and overanalysis?  It’s a goodie, and I liked most of it.  Green Lantern Corps #35 scores 3 out of 5 stars overall, with the hope that the rest of the ‘Blackest Night’ is handled on this type of personal scale…