Comic review: Green Lantern-New Guardians #36 (Godhead Act 2, Part 3)- Weak sauce

Writer: Justin Jordan
Artist: Diogenes Neves
Publisher: DC Comics
Released: 19th November 2014


I didn’t know too much about Kyle Rayner, the legendary White Lantern of the Lantern universe before reading this book. All I knew was what I had been reading in this Godhead arc, so I had this idea that he was a super powerful character who had bridged the very boundaries of reality itself. Pretty impressive, and more so when you consider that not only had he gone through these barriers of realty, but he had returned as well, more powerful than ever.

Crazed dictator alert

In Green Lantern-New Guardians #36 this mighty, powerful, reality changing character voluntarily gives all of his power away to a cartoon villain who walks around with a big neon sign above his head flashing:

*******CRAZED DICTATOR***********
*******CRAZED DICTATOR***********
*******CRAZED DICTATOR***********
*******CRAZED DICTATOR***********

Errrrrr, why did the great White Lantern do that? Why did he give his ring away? That kind of makes no sense. And now he’s moaning about it, saying that he’s made a stupid mistake. Well, no s*** Sherlock. What the Hell was going on here?

This is coming across like one of those occasions where story progression forces characters to act like idiots. It comes across as very soap opera, and not very believable at all. Kyle Rayner is either stupid, gullible, or both. He’s also a bit of a whining b***h as well. With heroes like this it’s no wonder that the villains are having such an easy time of it in the Godhead arc right now.

Very rushed and unimpressive artwork here

I’m not sure if the White Lantern was always this lame, but wow, what a useless, clueless twerp he turned out to be.

As for the artwork in this book, it looks rushed and unfinished. It’s noticeably lacking in detail and colour, and it appears to have been hurried out on a strict deadline. There’s one panel that needs to be good, the panel where the White Lantern is introduced to the new Genesis. His reaction is amazement at how awesome it all is, but in this comic book the art shows a half-page of beige coloured and roughly sketched sand dunes, not impressive at all.

That’s it for this week in the Godhead arc. A moaning White Lantern who voluntarily gives his power away to the most obvious villain since Ming the Merciless, some rushed looking art, and that’s it, the end. It’s a massive fail, and in comparison to last week’s impressive outing by writer Van Jensen and artist Bernard Chang (I gave that issue of Green Lantern Corps #36 a very well deserved 9/10) it’s chalk and cheese.

I guess that’s what you are going to get in these long crossover arcs with different artists and different writers working on the same story week to week. Sometimes it will be good, and sometimes it will be bad. This week, it’s bad. Oh well, let’s hope it’s swings and roundabouts and next week it’s gets good again.

Rating: 2/10 (and I’m being generous with that rating)