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Re: HAL JORDAN RETURNS IN OCTOBER'S REBIRTH

April 28 2004 at 2:27 PM
  (Login HDSchellnack)
Byrne Victim

Well, I never was much of a Kyle-Gl fan, too Keanu Reaves for me, and Hal Jordan, as done by Fox, Kane and O'neil, Adams and Grell, reallly worked very well for me, so I basically am happy to see Green Lantern return to something I knew as a kid. But I'mnot sure if, beyond that personal pleasure, it is asolid decision. It seems that DC is busily turning the clock backwards, unmaing stuff that happened during or after the Crisis event. And while the nostalgic reader in me likes that, of course, having grown up with Curt Swan, Irv Novick, Dick Dillin, Adams, Aparo... and all that... I wonder if there is any real clean way back. See, giving the Wally-West-Flash a secret ID again is a neat idea, but in the terms of the story it didn't work for mew. This deus ex machina simply showed me THAT THE WRITER WANTED IT THAT WAY... it didn't naturally flow out of the story but it was a higher non-story-intrinsic goal that was achieved here... and so Johns went for the easiest option to change the status quo, doing it as quick and painless as possible. Yet it still felt forced... hey, presto Spectre. A neat Doom-Patrol-Style reboot even seems clean compared to such stuff. And I fear for much of the same for GL. You simply cannot undo the mess that's been done to that character over decades with a single stroke.
And of course it harms the credibility of DC. If such mega-events can be undone, then, of course, everything can. While this is true for most comics these days, its getting harder and harder to care for any new revamp. Why care for Doom Patrol, when another writer will re-invent them in a few years anyway? Personally, I don't have much of a problem with that per se -- comics are a transient medium -- but I'm sure it will alienate some readers.

 

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