Hal Pictures Green Lantern Butt's FOREVER!: Green Lantern Corps #19

Green Lantern Butt's FOREVER!

Now with Guy Gardner's Seal of Approval!

Thursday, December 13, 2007

Green Lantern Corps #19

Well! Just...well! Is it possible to be both enchanted and enraged all at the same time? I really really liked this issue. It dealt with the fallout from the final battle from the Sinestro Corps war beautifully, with so many of the characters having a moment in the sun. And then there was the reunion of Guy and Ice...which drove me nuts.

But for the good, there is the beautifully done beginning, with Guy and Kyle on the Statue of Liberty, and their subsequent interaction, which was just...perfect. It's obvious that these two are friends, and that however gruffly expressed, Guy cares about what Kyle went through. It's also obvious that Kyle is just glad to be back, and is looking forward to working with Guy.

Then there was the pathos of Kilowog's reunion with the ghosts of him family on Mogo, which made me sniffle a little. Vath is sitting in a bar, as his date gets bored, but he's intoning the names of all the dead, which is also a touching moment. There is Issamot's defiance and exhilaration that he's NOT dead. Iolande shows her boredom in her royal duties, and her eagerness to use her Green Lantern powers.

There is an interesting moment with Salakk, as deep within the battery on Oa, he creates twelve "super" rings forged from 442 regular rings. THAT has to be ominous. Meanwhile Soranik is throwing herself into the work of helping and healing the wounded, which has to be more to her taste than blowing up Sinestro Corp members.

Kyle is shown again, wandering around a space museum and musing to himself over whether or not to accept a job as Art Director, and how can it compare to his OTHER job. Guy is also shown again, slopping around in a storage unit, trying to figure out where to live, by throwing glowing green darts at a map, and rejecting Flagstaff, Arizona, because it's "too damn hot." All of which leads me to believe that instead of being solely on Oa, as he has been for quite some time, both he and Kyle will have lives on Earth as well.

Then Green Man and Stel fail to capture an Sinestro Corp member from escaping. The Sinestro Corp guy falls into the decidedly unlovely hands of Mongul Jr.
Green Lanterns


So...it lives up to the cover, we have a bit of interaction with everybody there, and I enjoyed it thoroughly.

Except...

Well, they got THIS right at any rate.

Guy and Ice

I think that's just perfect. Look, it's Guy finding out that Ice is still alive!

Except...

From the way that it is presented, Guy just walks up to her, grabs her and kisses her, and then says hi, and she says she needs some time to think things over?

What the heck just happened here? Where was the "Oh my God, you're ALIVE!" moment? It seems obvious that Guy knows somehow that she's alive, but I don't have any idea when or where that happened. Did Bea tell him? Did Oracle or the Justice League? Any one of these things could have happened, but they don't show it.

Dammit. I was hoping for Rhett and Scarlet, and I ended up with Archie and Veronica.

Guy........."Hey Ice, It's me! Let's make out!"

Tora........."I've been dead....I have to wash my hair!"

Ok, so I'm paraphrasing. Guy does spill his guts to her, and she just keeps moaning that she was dead for so long, and she needs some time to process all of this. And bless his heart, Guy doesn't have a temper tantrum, he backs off and promises her a wooing. He'll pick her up for a date in one month, same bat time, same bat channel...er...place.

And that's that. I at least wanted a comment from her that he'd cut his hair! C'mon Tora, get your act together!

To be fair however, I must go back to just before Tora was killed, and all the hoohah over Emerald Fallout and such. Things hadn't been completely rosy between the two of them at the time, although Guy was doing his best to be nice. So maybe Tora is just remembering all of that, instead of leaping into his arms. Although she sure did seem happy to see Bea.

Oh well. At least she's alive, and that's something. So this was really very good. I'm just suffering from reading too many romance novels.

9 Comments:

At 10:39 AM, Blogger ticknart said...

Sally, as much as Guy and Ice love each other and work so well together, Fire is Ice's soul mate. They were the two who balanced each other out in ways that no one else could. That's why I think Tora's reaction to seeing Guy was so different from her reaction when she saw Bea again.

 
At 11:07 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

I want to be hopeful but my gut says this is the set up for Guy getting sucker punched by fate yet again. He's going to show up to the date with a big bouquet of flowers and an earnest smile and Ice will either not be there at all or if she is, she'll end the evening by teling him that she's not the Ice he knew and loved anymore and that it would just hurt both of them to try and recreate the shattered past.
There'll be a closing shot of the flowers crumpled in a waste basket and Guy walking away slump-shouldered.

The opportunity to hurt him is just too tempting, DC won' be able to pass it up.

 
At 11:25 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

I was disappointed in the scene as well - and my fears are pretty much the same as cornfed's.

Other than that, I really enjoyed the issue. Some of the scenes (particularly Vath's and Kilowog's) were really touching

 
At 12:01 PM, Blogger Sea-of-Green said...

I knew you were going to be less than thrilled by that scene between Guy and Ice, Sally. I agree with you completely, though -- where was the "OMG you're alive" moment? Otherwise, I thought it was a very satisfying followup to Sinestro War.

Can't wait to see what kind of havok Mongul is going to unleash now that he has a ring. ;-)

 
At 2:42 PM, Blogger Will said...

It touched me a whole lot when Guy was telling Tora that'd he go through a whole lot of zero hours and crisises for her. That was pretty sweet.

 
At 4:55 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

I haven't read gl 25 yet (surely tomorrow I hope) but I had read GLC 19, I really like the different epilogues, very much in tone with each member.

And I don't know... I was cheated by kilowog's one, to be honest I think I cheated myself, I must have seen the "sector 2261 Mogo" caption et I must have seen the green auras around the family... but...
I was surprised to see Kilowog with his family, I thought: he is not the only survivor of his race? after that I thought maybe there was a retcon I ignored... and I saw the last image... Mogo... and I put all the pieces back together... and I understood... so after the joy I had for the kilowog's family portrait, I felt a sense of loss and sadness...
Very strange... ordinary I focus on very details so I am not easily fooled but this time, I am sure I wanted to be fooled.
Very strange... but it gaves me an idea that I will explore in my writings... We will see...
I liked Guy and Ice though... Not the first time... I was surprised to see Ice reaction and I was sad for Guy, and after some seconds I started to think like this, like maybe Ice could think : Guy comes and kissed her, in fact he considers her as granted... the way he speaked, this kiss... And Ice don't appreciate this and I can understand that.
I am totally agree the odds seems to be against Guy, I think he know that but he take this chance... : He gives her this rendez-vous...
And when he left Ice has a smile.

Not much, but I think Guy could see the little chance they had in this smile. It is not much but it is something.
And above all, he leaves her her liberty, he has expressed his feeling and he proposes her to start from the beginning again, he let her decide if she will come or not. Zero manipulation... He chose in fact to let her decides what she will think is good for her.

Maybe all of this is some kind of personal delirium, but dawn I love it.

He knows that he will certainly loose, be hurt but he tries anyway... In fact I admire this...
Fighting big villains is something... but being like this is something too.

N.

 
At 4:21 AM, Blogger Mr. Bretterson said...

This comment has been removed by the author.

 
At 4:28 AM, Blogger Mr. Bretterson said...

Okay, everybody probably noticed this, but I thought I'd point out that the kiss is a nice homage.

V–J day in Times Square

 
At 9:13 AM, Blogger SallyP said...

Yes, it was a nice homage, and I did notice the pose.

I'm glad that I'm not the only one who was feeling a little bit...eh, about their reunion. I just feel a bit sorry for Guy.

I WANTED some passion and tenderness...and I got it. Except that I got it with Guy and Kyle!

But the rest of the book was great, although I was practically snivelling over Kilowog.

 

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