Green Lantern’s Light

Green Lantern: A Celebration of 75 Years is a strange book. Like this whole series of celebrations from DC, it is a fabulous way to see the development of a superhero. That is not the same thing as seeing a “best of” series, though. In an overview like this, you see the character at both high and low points in development. And, wow, does Green Lantern have some low points. It’s not his fault though; he was a poorly conceived character from the start.

First, the bit of trivia known only to the aficionados: Green Lantern is not a person, it is a power charging unit for a ring that allows you to wear a Green Uniform. There have been five (yes, 5!) different people who took on the title of Green Lantern. Five on Earth, that is. There are a zillion Green Lanterns scattered across the universe. Well, not a zillion. Just something more than 7200.

You thought there was only one Green Lantern because the one who is best known is Hal Jordan, ace test pilot who is given the Green Lantern Ring. There was a movie about this Green Lantern…a movie that if you saw, you are trying desperately to forget. But, Hal wasn’t the first Green Lantern. That would be Alan Scott.

Scott was created in 1940. A meteor fell to earth “many years ago in old China” and someone turned the metal into a lamp (like the one a genie is trapped in), and then many years later for no apparent reason someone else turned it into an old-fashioned train lantern, and then later than that the lantern finds Alan Scott and gives him the power to create anything he wants with his mind. There are two limitations, though. First, the only color “anything he wants” comes in is green. And second, the power does not affect wood things…which makes zero sense, but whatever. Alan Scott was a total bore. The comic book is canceled. End of Green Lantern.

Then in 1959, seeking new comic book heroes, the Green Lantern is reborn, but in a slightly better way. Now there is a whole intergalactic Green Lantern Corps, who run around the Universe doing good things with Green Power Lamps and Rings. Hal Jordan is selected to be the Green Lantern of Earth because he is such a noble guy. He can create anything he wants and now he can even affect wood! Hooray! Ah, but he can’t affect anything that is yellow. Because…well, just go with it.

But, the Green Lantern stories run into an obvious problem. If you can create anything you want, what can you create? Suppose you meet Villain (who is obviously Bad). You want to stop Villain. How do you stop Villain? Pick your favorite way of crushing or immobilizing Villain. Problem solved. Next issue, repeat. You like crushing Villain under a massively heavy boulder? Well, just do that over and over. You like Encasing Villain in a solid block of impenetrable metal. Done. You like picking up villain with a giant hand and hurling him into outer space. Go ahead. No need to think about it, just pick one and use it every time.

Now, that would be very boring to read month after month. So, what do you do instead? Think of corny puns and create something that visualizes the corny pun. Sweep away the problem…with a Giant Broom and Dustpan! Get it?

After a few decades, you can tell the writers realized the character was stale, so suddenly a couple of other characters are born who can also be a Green Lantern whenever the writer needs something else to do.

Even that doesn’t work for too long. So then Hal Jordan, Mr. Green Lantern Himself, goes crazy and destroys the whole Green Lantern Universe! Don’t worry, the Green Lantern Corps is not completely destroyed. (Insert sigh of relief.) A new Green Lantern emerges. And most importantly, the new guy has a hot girlfriend who wears Oakland Raiders apparel! (I love her.) Then she dies. (How do you kill off the girlfriend who like the Raiders? How? Obviusly DC Comics has been infiltrated by Chiefs fans. I demand an investigation.)

And, so what do we learn from 75 years of Green Lantern comics? Quite a bit, actually. A character this strangely overpowered should never have lasted so long and become such a central part of the DC Universe. The thing that keeps him interesting is the fact that he is not an individual with superpowers. Alone among the Superheroes, he is important and powerful because he is a member of a Corps. It is only membership in the group that gives him power.

That idea that the group is what gives us the ability to do something obviously strikes a deep chord. We tend to think of superheroes as lone individuals fighting evil. Sometimes the lone individuals team up (see: The Justice League, the Avengers), but these are collections of individuals; the interactions of those individuals is what makes the team-ups so interesting.

The Green Lantern, on the other hand, does not exist without the Green Lantern Corps. He has a code he has to follow. He has a mantra he has to repeat every single day. The mantra is key:

In Brightest Day, In Blackest Night,
No Evil Shall Escape My Sight!
Let those who Worship Evil’s Might
Beware My Power—Green Lantern’s Light.

That is an interesting idea. Imagine a group of people fighting against the Dark Forces of Evil. Imagine that the people fighting against that evil have no power of their own. Imagine they can only derive their power by tapping into a power source of Light. And imagine the power of that Light cannot actually be used to do whatever you want; it can only be used to advance the Light against the Forces of Darkness and Evil.

Would that be a powerful narrative? Would lots of people be attracted to the idea that they too could tap into the Light and fight against Evil? The Green Lantern mythos wasn’t created in 1940 after all. It showed up about 2000 years earlier:

[The] light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil. For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his works should be exposed. But whoever does what is true comes to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that his works have been carried out in God.