Green Lantern #43 Review

We have finally arrived at the “official” prologue to Blackest Night with Green Lantern #43. The road to Blackest Night has been a long one. Johns has been building up to Blackest Night for more than a year. I am glad that we are finally here so we can get this big event underway. Hopefully, Green Lantern #43 presents us with a more exciting read that builds up the reader’s interest in Blackest Night. Let’s hit this review.

Creative Team
Writer: Geoff Johns
Pencils: Doug Mahnke
Inks: Christian Alamy
Colors: Randy Mayor

Art Rating: 9 Night Girls out of 10
Story Rating: 6 Night Girls out of 10
Overall Rating: 7.5 Night Girls out of 10

Synopsis: The issue begins with the disclaimer that the events in this issue take place prior to Blackest Night #0. (Great. Just what Blackest Night needs. Even more back-story.) We see Scar reading the Book of Black. Scar thinks how no one is supposed to live forever.

We get a re-telling for the millionth time about how the Guardians have been around forever. That they first created the Manhunters to be the universe’s police force. That the Manhunters had a “programming error” that led them to exterminate an entire space sector. That the Guardians decommissioned the Manhunters and then harnessed the power of the green light and created the Green Lantern Corps.

Scar talks about the Blackest Night prophecy from the Book of Oa. Scar runs through the different colors of the emotional spectrum. Green for willpower, Blue for hope, Indigo for compassion, Violet for love, Red for rage, Yellow for fear and Orange for avarice. Scar says that Green is at the center of the emotional spectrum. Scar says that she welcomes the darkness and will take part in the birth of the Black Lantern Corps.

We cut to Black Hand lying in a grave nestled up to four skeletons. Black Hand narrates the rest of this issue. He says that his name is William Hand and that he believes that there is life after death. That it is a cold and eternal blackness. His heart is filled with death and he is happy at this moment.

Hand says that the destination for everyone is death. Hand says that death is supposed to be forever. However, people have kept coming back from the dead. And that is because someone has allowed that to happen. Hand then says that he can hear death calling his name.

Hand then proceeds to conveniently and politely recount his origin for us. That even as a little boy he was fascinated by death. Hand’s father was a mortician and Hand thought the corpses were “pretty.” Hand thinks how no one in his family related to him. Hand was so obsessed with death that he demanded for his mother to serve his meat to him bloody rare. (Okay, I get it. The dude really likes death.)

We learn that Hand likes to kill animals like birds and squirrels and then stuff them. (Ah, taxidermy. Appropriately creepy. This character is a collection of every cliché possible.) We then see Hand stare at the family dog. (Oh gee, I wonder what is going to happen next?)

We then see how the family dog went missing and the family searched everywhere for it. We see little Billy Hand outside with his father proudly picking out his own gravesite already. Little Billy Hand was all too excited to be a mortician and take over his father’s family business. The family eventually finds the family dog stuffed and posing on the mantle in Hand’s room. (And there it is. Exactly what we expected.) The family then has little Billy Hand go see a series of therapists for his affliction of being a walking caricature.

William Hand grew up as the black sheep of the family. Then one day, Atrocitus came crashing into the funeral home. Atrocitus said that Hand’s insides held the doorway to absolute darkness. Atrocitus has the divining cosmic rod in his hand. Suddenly, Hal and Sinestro show up on the scene and quickly take down Atrocitus. Hand sees that Atrocitus dropped the cosmic rod. Hand grabs it and slinks away from the scene without talking to Hal.

Hand then discovered that the rod could disintegrate things. Hand then lies down in an open grave and thinks about how the Green Lantern’s light haunted him and kept him awake. Hand felt to compulsion to shut the green light off.

We cut to Hand back at the mortuary and watching the news report of Hal fighting Star Sapphire. Hand says that he knew that the divining rod would lead him to the Green Lantern. We see Hand making his own costume. Hand makes his costume out of a body bag. (Oh, of course he does.) Hand narrates how he finally wore clothes that he felt comfortable in.

We shift to Black Hand battling Hal Jordan. During their first brawl, Hal did not recognize the divining rod that Black Hand was wielding. Hand thinks how every time he fought Hal he would lose. Then more Green Lanterns came to Earth and Black Hand could sense their lights as well. Then one day the light went out. We see that is the day when Hal became Parallax.

But, then a spark of that green light came back when Hal Jordan became the Spectre. Black Hand then battled the Spectre and the result was the Spectre removing one of Black Hand’s hands. Later, Hand was abducted by a group of aliens who rebuilt his hand and have it a death touch. Hand could now hear, touch and see death. We see that each time a character in the DCU was killed that Black Hand could see it.

This includes the deaths of Tula, Ted Kord, Al Pratt, Digger Harkness, Phantom Lady, Roy Lincoln, Ralph Dibny Sue Dibny, Jean Loring, Ronnie Raymond, Maxwell Lord, Psycho Pirate, Vic Sage, Dr. Light, Martian Manhunter, Ryan Kendall, Deadman, Terra, Sandman, Aquaman, Jonathon Kent, Jade and Bruce Wayne. (And there, ladies and gentlemen, is a quick look at the core membership of the Black Lantern Corps.) We see Black Hand in a graveyard saying “Yes. I’m listening. I’m heeeeerree.”

Black Hand then says that he sees those who have escaped death as well. A voice colored in black (The mysterious Lord of the Black Lanterns.) lists Clark Kent, Hal Jordan, Oliver Queen, Diana Prince, Kilowog, Conner Kent, Bart Allen and Barry Allen. Black Hand says “You want them back.” The voice answers “I want them all.”

We cut to Black Hand’s family having dinner together. Black Hand arrives at the front door and rings the doorbell. One of the brothers answers the door. Black Hand kills the brother. Black Hand then enters the house and kills the other brother. Black Hand then kills his mother. Black Hand then kills his father.

The voice then tells Black Hand that he is not done yet. That there is one more death. Black Hand sits at the dinner table and then shoots himself in the head with the divining rod.

Scar then appears on the scene. Scar says “This pleases him.” The voice then says “He is ready.” Scar says “Yes.” Scar barfs up some black goo. (Ahh, the puking of blood or black goo on this title never gets old.) The voice says “Flesh. William Hand of Earth. Rise.”

A black power ring appears on Black Hand’s hand. Black Hand then stands up and is now zombie-fied and powered by the Black Light. Scar says that Black Hand is the embodiment of their corps. That Black Hand is the Black incarnate. The Black Hand is their lord’s herald.

Black Hand then says “And with this power I will finally extinguish the light.” End of issue.

Comments
The Good: Green Lantern #43 was an average read. The road to Blackest Night has been the biggest built-up to a big event that I can remember. I feel like we have been getting an endless serious of “prologues” to this event for at least a year.

Having said that, Green Lantern #43 did actually feel like a legitimate prologue to Blackest Night. The Black Lantern Corps are going to be the main villains in Blackest Night and it was about time that Johns finally got them up and running.

Johns constructed some solid dialogue. The inner monologue, while heavy handed at some points, was generally well done. The inner monologue served as a nice spine for this story and a way to give the reader necessary information about Black Hand without interrupting the montage of Black Hand’s origin.

The best aspect of Johns’ effort in this issue was his handling of Black Hand’s character. Johns does a fine job introducing Black Hand’s character to readers who are unfamiliar with him. Black Hand is not a big name character. And since Johns is making Black Hand a big player in Blackest Night, it is incumbent upon him to make sure that readers unfamiliar with this villain understand who he is and how he relates to Hal Jordan and the Green Lantern mythos.

Johns proceeds to make several tweaks to Black Hand’s origin in order to better mesh Black Hand into Green Lantern’s current continuity. Originally, Black Hand invented the divining rod. Now, Johns inserts Atrocitus into Black Hand’s origin. Atrocitus is searching for the source of the Black. And once Atrocitus gets captured, Black Hand ends up stealing the divining rod that Atrocitus had with him. This was a nice retcon to Black Hand’s origin that properly meshes Black Hand into Johns’ current take on the Green Lantern mythos.

The other purpose of this issue was to give the reader some more information about the Black Lantern Corps. Not that the Black Lantern Corps is a particularly complex or difficult to understand concept, but we do not know anything about the structure of the Black Lantern Corps or its membership.

We now know that there is a mysterious voice that is the Lord of the Black Lantern Corps. Maybe the voice is a remnant of the Anti-Monitor whose corpse was used as the source for the Black Lantern power battery. We then have Scar who serves the Lord of the Black Lanterns. Then we have Black Hand who is the Black Lanterns’ herald. Just like Parallax and Ion, Black Hand is the embodiment of the Black Lantern Corps.

Johns also gives the reader a nice and convenient laundry list of all the dead people in the DCU who should all be members of the Black Lantern Corps. It should be interesting to see our heroes having to battle so many of their fallen friends and teammates. While not particularly riveting reading, this list of characters was informative and gives the reader a preview of who they can expect to see in the Black Lantern Corps.

Johns also gives the reader a list of characters that have cheated death. I would imagine that these are the characters that will officially be the main targets of the Black Lantern Corps. Also, with Johns giving the Black Lantern Corps targets outside of the various colored Lanterns, we see how Johns is making Blackest Night a DCU event that will have an impact on Earth.

Johns ends Green Lantern #43 with a nice ending. Seeing Black Hand wielding a black power ring and ready to serve Death certainly got me excited for Blackest Night. Johns has made the reader wait a long time to finally see a Black Lantern. So, this moment was quite gratifying.

Hands down, the best part of Green Lantern #43 was the gorgeous artwork by Doug Mahnke and Christian Alamy. This was a fantastic looking issue with several dramatic splash pages. The artwork helped to bring some much needed intensity to a rather dry story. I also greatly appreciate the vast amounts of detail that Mahnke pours into his art.

The Bad: Green Lantern #43 was not a particularly dynamic and exciting prologue to Blackest Night. This issue was too one-dimensional and heavy handed for my taste. This issue could easily be summed up with just one word: Death. And that is a reoccurring problem with the different colored Corps. The very nature of their design and structure is that they are one-dimensional and exaggerated.

This was particularly noticeable with the story arc involving the Red Lanterns. It involved plenty of puking of blood and yelling “Rage” every other sentence. In Green Lantern #43, we get the theme of Death pounded into the ground. And we get more puking. This time it is black goo instead or red liquid. Thank goodness Johns kept the puking theme going.

Green Lantern #43 was a poorly paced. Of course, that comes as no surprise given that this is Geoff Johns that we are talking about. Johns loves decompression to the extreme. Green Lantern #43 was a slow and lumbering read. The first ten pages of this issue were slow, but they were necessary in bringing new readers up to speed on Black Hand’s character and tweaking his origin to better fit Johns’ Green Lantern mythos.

However, the second half of this issue got bogged down too much. We got four pages detailing the laundry list of names. Then we got four pages to show Black Hand killing his family and then himself. This story was just way too decompressed. Having said that, I am sure that Green Lantern #43 will read much better when combined with Blackest Night #0 and the rest of Blackest Night in a deluxe edition hard cover collection.

I found Johns’ handling of Black Hand’s character a bit too ham-handed at certain points. Black Hand became a bit cartoonish and more of a caricature than an actual fully developed character. Johns relied on a series of serial killer clichés in filling out Black Hand’s newly tweaked origin. Sometimes less is more and it seems that Johns went a little overboard with Black Hand’s personality and his origin. It was just a little too goofy.

It got to the point where I found Black Hand to be more comical than a dreaded evil villain. I was chuckling to myself at points of this issue where I do not think that Johns intended to me to do so. One point in particular was when we got to the moment when Black Hand made his costume out of a body bag and commented that he finally felt comfortable. It was just too much and I burst out laughing.

But, to be fair, Black Hand is the herald for the Black Lantern Corps. He is their Parallax. So, by Johns’ very design Black Hand should be a one note character that embodies Death. It is more of a me problem as I find this type of character to be dreadfully boring. I could have tolerated Black Hand’s character more if he had only played a supporting role in this issue. However, this entire issue centered on Black Hand and his character as the main character made for a shallow and one-dimensional read.

Overall: Green Lantern #43 was a serviceable read that did its primary job of establishing the Black Lantern Corps and setting forth their mission directive for Blackest Night. I suspect that readers who enjoyed the Red Lantern story arc and the Agent Orange story arc will also enjoy this issue. Green Lantern is important for readers unfamiliar with Black Hand and his role in the Green Lantern mythos. Also, this issue is a definite direct prologue into Blackest Night and it serves as a nice bridge from Green Lantern into Blackest Night #0. Despite my criticisms with this issue, I would still recommend getting Green Lantern #43 if you have decided to jump aboard Blackest Night.
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Rokk