So Rokk already gave you all his opinion on Blackest Night #7, but as you all know we all have different mindsets here at the Revolution so we all have different tastes and opinions. So I’m going to do Another Take at Blackest Night to give you all my opinion. There will be no synopsis, you can check out Rokk’s review for that, and I’ll be using a style similar to my reviews at my old blog where rather then talking about the good and the bad, I talk about the story, the art and have opening and closing comments. Now with all that said lets head into the 2nd to final issue of Blackest Night!
Creative Team
Writer: Geoff Johns
Artist: Ivan Reis
Story Rating: 7 Night Girls out of 10
Art Rating: 8 Night Girls out of 10
Overall Rating: 7.5 Night Girls out of 10
Opening Comments: I’ve been losing interest more and more in Blackest Night as well as its follow up Brightest Day. What seemed like an epic event has just turned into “Oh shit the dead are back, now I’m going to make you feel bad and kill some people” and that’s been most of it for the last 8 months. With a few exceptions here and there.
I was starting to regret picking up Blackest Night, even with the cool twist of the new Lanterns at the end of last issue. But though I came into this issue with low expectations I’ll admit Johns worked some magic and gave the best issue of Blackest Night since it’s strong debut.
Story Comments: When talking about the good and bad with Blackest Night #7 I think the bad does sort of outweigh the good in most aspects. The worst part of Blackest Night for me has been the pacing, it’s been all over the map. One issue will be fast paced and fun but the next will be slow and boring and the same old crap we’ve seen before from this series.
This issue was actually a mix of the good and bad pacing. For one, only one thing is really accomplished in this issue and that’s Sinestro becoming the White Lantern. Other then that this issue really didn’t do anything else, and while that one moment was great enough to carry the issue and boost it up into being much better then I had thought it would be I still wish there was a little more to this issue.
I will admit I did like seeing Lex Luthor go crazy but it was also a somewhat confusing scene when he pulls of Scarecrows ring. I was very confused, did Scarecrow lose the power now? What happened to him? We didn’t see him afterwards and he just sort of disappeared. Now I did love the twist of Scarecrow being a Sinestro Corps member so I hope he got the ring back for the end of Blackest Night at least.
Another moment I liked was the death of a guardian, when he was asked why they even protect the universe and he admitted he forgot. It’s things like that which stand out about Blackest Night, the smaller more interesting moments that make readers think. This moment had me contemplating the point of guarding the universe if you’ve done it for so long you no longer care.
And when you think about it, it does make sense. Eventually after eons you would forget why you guard the universe as well. The beauties of life and a vast solar system would be lost on you as you would have seen it all so many times before. So with moments like this I have to applaud that despite how small it was it still could impact the reader.
Then there’s of course the biggest moment of this issue and that was Sinestro becoming the White Lantern. We all knew a White Lantern was inevitable and we all knew he was likely going to be Hal Jordan. But Johns went with the less obvious choice but in doing so gave us a better choice I think. I don’t think he chose Sinestro just to be smart and trick the fans.
Sinestro makes sense as the White Lantern because he’s not your typical “I want everyone dead because I’m evil” type of villain. He had a greater purpose which is what makes great villains like Magneto so much more interesting. So seeing Sinestro take the power of life itself to save the universe really was a powerful and epic moment and it was a great way to end off the issue.
Also Johns finally got me to add Green Lantern to my pull list! Yeah, these past 8 months I’ve only picked up 2 issues of Green Lantern and just read about the rest of them online. I really wanted to read them, but expenses said otherwise. But I have to be there to read the penultimate chapter of Blackest Night later in March, I have to, no Internet Synopsis can do what happens next any justice.
Also Johns reinvigorated my interest in the post-Blackest Night stories. If you read my Solicit Commentary for May 2010 then you know I wasn’t excited at all for Brightest Day, and while for the most part I still am not, I definitely will be reading Green Lantern form now on because I’m dying ot see what happens next with the New Guardians after Blackest Night.
So on all those accounts Johns did a good job with Blackest Night, but even with all that praise I still didn’t love this issue as much as I wanted to. For one the pacing in this issue was still rather weak since even though we got 2 or so moments leading up to the awesome final page, the rest of the comic was still weakly paced and didn’t do much else.
I honestly think this could have been shortened down to 4 to 5 issues and it would have been so much better. My guess is DC told Johns to stretch it out to 8 which would explain why issues 3 and 4 where basically the exact same thing 2 months in a row. I hate useless padding and that is what has been Blackest Night’s biggest weakness.
I should of course mention the other Lanterns showing up, which while it was an awesome moment at the same time I think this should have happened 4 issues ago. Again it feels like the Lanterns are all late to their own event and that is just annoying in my eyes. I know they’ve been doing their own thing in Green Lantern Corps but I wish they where more prominent still in the main Blackest Night book since it is their event.
I did find it cliché that life started on earth so that’s where the entity of life is. While it did make sense as to why Blackest Night is taking place on earth and why Nekron came here it still just felt a little too cliché for my tastes. Why not have all life start in the middle of the sun or something? It’s just as cliché at this rate.
The entity itself, I have mixed feelings about the design. While I like that most of the design is pretty much just alien looking, the angel wings where just laughable. Just in case we needed to know that this is the good guy, he’s got big angel wings which shows that he’s super nice. I found that hilarious to be honest with you it’s one of the weirder clichés nowadays.
Overall though I did enjoy Blackest Night #7’s story even if it wasn’t perfect. Johns did a solid job on making an interesting and enjoyable read as well as hooking me back into Blackest Night and leaving me eager for more.
Art Comments: the art for this issue was a real mixed bag for me. Because most of the time it was awesome and looked great, especially the gorgeous double spreads. Reis turned in work that was akin to that of the legendary George Perez. But despite that I could still tell there where bits here and there that looked rather rushed.
Still the art was great most of the time but every now and then there was a rushed looking panel or bit here and there. It doesn’t ruin the art by any means but it did hold me back from giving it a higher rating then a solid 8. Overall though the art was still great.
Final Comments: Blackest Night #7 still turned out to be the best issue of the event since the first issue. It had some good moments, an awesome cliff-hanger and great art and left me wanting more and eager to see what happened next. Not much more I can ask of an event comic so I’d have to say it was a strong success.