The Rogue
Tommorow, May 22nd, is a historic and sad day in the comic world. With issue #20 of Green Lantern, Geoff Johns will end his legendary run as the chief writer in the Green Lantern Universe.
Over at Comic Resources, they ran a great interview with Johns on why he decided to end his time on GL. Reading the interview, I respect his decision. He wants to end his story the right way and not to try to press it beyond its welcome.
Still, I can’t help but feel a bit sad. Geoff Johns, it’s safe to say, rescued Green Lantern from the DC Trash heap and gave us something mind blowing. He gave us the Emotional Spectrum of the other Rings. He gave us legendary stories like The Sinestro War and Blackest Night.
However, what I’ll remember the most is how he gave us, in comic books, the idea that God created the emotions and they are good. Even more, he gave us the idea that only those who know they need to be redeemed won’t be destroyed.
Johns says in the Comic Resources interview that:
There was darkness and then there was light, and this is what the light is — life isn’t just mass and matter but this intangible energy that is comprised of beings who are sentient, emotional, living creatures. The theme of going back to the creation of time and re-writing time and the universe and playing with darkness and light — that there was something before this universe and he became a big threat to what the universe turned into — there’s been a lot of instances where I’ve had villains, whether it be Nekron or the Guardians or the Manhunters, who want order in life, and the only way to have it is to remove emotion. Or they think emotion causes chaos. That’s true, emotion causes chaos, but without emotion there is no life. The two things are intertwined.
Johns has used his whole Green Lantern run to explore how emotions are a vital part of the created universe. He certainly implies in many of the issues he wrote that God created it that way. In his “Resurrection” of Hal Jordan in Green Lantern: Rebirth, Hal is possessed with Specter, The Spirit of God’s Vengeance. Except, the Spectre has lost its way and has now forgotten mercy. Throughout the story of rebirth, Hal Jordan looks for redemption from Specter and the spirit of fear, Parallax. Once free of them, Jordan realizes his redemption has just begun. Even more, he starts to recognize how everyone around him is in need of this a second chance.
This story line plays out in the characters in the Green Lantern universe and in the end, the only ones beyond redemption seem to be the Guardians who think they don’t need it. They stand “above” the universe because, supposedly, they’ve emptied themselves of emotion, caring, love, feeling and avoiding admitting they were afraid. In the end, the product of the Guardains cast off emotions, The First Lantern, destroys them. Their lack of the need for redemption is their undoing.
Indeed, in the final Johns story line, the villain, the First Lantern, has the power of every emotion. But, unlike Jordan, it has corrupted him and made him power mad. He has the ability to show every character in the GL universe their past and even scarier; the ability to see what might have happened if they choose differently.
Hal Jordan fights The First Lantern by not wanting more power, but by giving up his life. In fact, He has given up his life for the universe twice now. He’s been resurrected twice. He knows he needs redemption but saves the universe by redemptive acts. He gives up his life, time and time again. And in the end, he becomes the greatest of all Lanterns, the master of all the emotions, including being the master of death.
Issue #20 of Green Lantern is on store shelves tomorrow.
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