The Green Lantern shake-ups keep on coming with a newly re-focused Kyle Rayner book that looks to make good on the promise that the subtitle “New Guardians” was holding all along.
Written by Justin Jordan
Illustrated by Brad WalkerThe Templar Guardians have been locked away for millennia, but they have a VERY clear idea of what they need to do next — and of all the Lanterns in the universe, they need Kyle Rayner’s help. So it’s a shame he wants nothing to do with them! But once he sees the strange anomaly lurking at the edge of the universe, he may have no choice but to get on board with their mission…
In the crossovers that led up to Geoff Johns departure, “New Guardians” made a few changes in Kyle Rayner’s character, most obvious of which was making him the white lantern. But through all of this, the mission statement of the book wasn’t exactly clear and the crossovers became increasingly homogenous and a little tiresome. Justin Jordan’s arrival is clearly ushering in a new direction that looks like it has a clear mission statement and also looks to bring the book back to a place where it’s allowed to be its own thing again. Well, at least until the ‘Lights Out’ crossover comes up.
One of the bigger changes in the wake of the lantern change-ups was instituting a new set of “Guardians” (you know – the little blue guys and gals). A recurring theme in Johns’ lantern era was how untrustworthy the Guardians were and how they were constantly mucking things up for our heroes, just as much as their enemies were. In fact, the Guardians became enemies. It got to the point where readers would clench up whenever a lantern was standing before the council, because you just knew that some severe guardian meddling was about to take place. Jordan smartly starts his issue off with Kyle in front of the new Guardians in a position of distrust of them. These claim to be an entirely different sort of guardian, but Jordan is building on a history with the guardian characters that has been historically rocky. It also informs us that Jordan gets the character of Kyle Rayner right, while taking care to fold in the newer aspects of his character. He’s still the “young” lantern – a brash and defiant type, but with a bit a leadership edge that he has earned during his time in the ‘New 52’. A reluctant leader, to be sure, but a respected figure none the less. Jordan shows a knack for writing Kyle and has already given him a reason to exist in a ‘New 52′ that is inundated with lantern characters new and old.
The first conflict in Jordan’s run looks a little mundane on the surface, but has the potential to also play upon the history of the DCU, depending on where Jordan is going with it and what he’s allowed to do. To say much more would be spoiling it, but there are references made to alternate universes that act as tease to things that could matter quite a bit to the entire DC Universe. As of right now, Kyle is up against what they are calling “The Anomaly” – yet another amorphous enemy to shoot lantern light at. Here’s hoping that Justin Jordan escalates this conflict toward the fascinating tease he seeds here and that the villain becomes more than a blob.
Jordan also takes a moment to tackle the relationship between Hal Jordan and Carol Ferris, using Kyle as a liaison. This scene spins directly out of what Robert Venditti did in his first issue of “Green Lantern”, but it doesn’t really play any better here. It still just feels like well-tread ground, but clearly appears to be something of a focus in the new direction of the lantern titles. Again, perhaps this will play out satisfyingly down the road, but it just seems like an odd diversion right now and is based in some strange logic regarding Carol’s status as Star Sapphire.
Brad Walker generated a lot of positive buzz for his work alongside Rags Morales on Grant Morrison’s “Action Comics” run. The styles didn’t really mesh together much, though due to scheduling constraints, they tried. It made it a little more difficult to fully appreciate either Morales’ or Walker’s art individually, but you could always see the ability that Walker possessed. Walker’s art here, especially with the careful inking of Andrew Hennessy, looks tremendous. Walker looks to have refined his ability to convey emotion and expression since his already solid “Action Comics” work, showing marked improvement in subtlety.
Continued belowHe captures some fun interplay between Kyle and the Guardians, but his best work is in his depiction of Kyle and Hal together. Through his art, you feel the generational gap between them, which is enhanced by some very key choices that Walker makes with his character designs. Walker’s Hal Jordan looks like he’s straight out of Gil Kane’s original artistic run on the character. Other modern takes on Hal have been clearly identifiable, but this Hal is unmistakably the same one that found Abin Sur’s crashed ship all those years ago. It was a really pleasant surprise to see what looked like a clear throwback. Rounding out the issue, Walker looks to be able to handle the galactic scope that a lantern book should possess, showing off the ability to pull out interesting alien designs and large scale battles against large scale monsters. Seeing Walker’s art alone in the spotlight has become a more exciting prospect thanks to his work on this issue.
The new direction for the lantern titles is not as immediately exciting or trend-making as the relaunch under Geoff Johns’ was 10 years ago. How could it ever be? On the positive side, the work cannot be accused of latching on to what Johns was doing and trying to milk it. Both Jordan and Walker’s best DC Comics work is present in this issue. Kyle Rayner seems to be a character that Jordan and Walker are excited about digging into, with ramifications that could potentially make the book pretty important to the overall ‘New 52’. “Green Lantern: New Guardians” #21 is one of those refreshing cases where you get to watch relatively inexperienced, but clearly talented people produce the sort of thing that you always knew they were capable of.
Final Verdict: 7.3 – Try the first issue, at least.
