Wrong again... we're
looking at Part 4 now... of SEVEN parts. I'm actually
thrilled it's going that extra issue -- if this "Secret
Origin" is to truly replace both "Emerald Dawn" and "Emerald
Dawn II" in canon it ought to be at least a somewhat
comparable length, shouldn't it? With a bit of a Hal fix
found this week alone in Superman #677 and most especially
Final Crisis #2 (Hal now wrongly being accused of the murder
of Orion), I find myself not terribly that bothered with
returning again to Hal in the past.
Knee deep in retcons
off the bat, we start with Hector Hammond being on-hand for
an examination of Abin Sur's spacecraft. He soon becomes
exposed to the meteorite-like power source of the ship, this
now becoming the origin of Hector's powers/curse. A pretty
huge retcon of the character... originally in GL Vol. 2 #5
and later JLA Vol. 1 #14 in the 60s, where his original
exposure in Africa was tied pretty sensibly/logically into
Gorilla Grodd's. Here we get a pretty abbreviated version,
molded to fit the story afoot... and I'm not convinced it's
really for the best of the character -- at all -- but it
makes good sense for the story. Unless Geoff has plans for
Hammond in this arc or pretty quick afterward that will pay
dividends to the large retcon we see here, I'd have much
rather seen Geoff replace Hammond with someone like the
Invisible Destroyer or such from way back then... someone GL
fans wouldn't be so invested in.
We see more of Tom
Kalmaku, here discovering Hal is GL. It's handled pretty
matter-of-factly here, but I like it. Geoff doesn't sell
short either the character of Tom or his friendship with
Hal, and this dovetails nicely into the revelation that all
the flyers of Arden's company had walked out with the Ferris
buyout.
The next scene I found
absolutely perfect. Really, I wouldn't change a thing about
it. A very human, very relatable Carol Ferris visibly
breaking down at her desk as things just aren't going the
way she planned with the company. Hal walks in and confronts
her, announcing his own plan to walk out and going off the
handle about blaming her father for the death of his own.
She lets him vent, then... as he's about to leave she asks
him simply, "Do you want to fly again?" No splash page to
underscore what is a perfectly poignant moment here is
wasted to show what Ivan and Geoff so effectively
illustrate... we see Hal do a complete 180. "What?" he asks.
As the scene ends, Hal reflects that he had somehow
forgotten that she, as a young girl, had cried even louder
than he did when his father had died in front of him. Every
bit as iconic as the moment ought to be.
More intrigue with
Atrocitus. We actually learn a bit more about how the Red
Lanterns will apparently operate... evidently Atrocitus
wasn't just talking in hyperbole when he smashed up the Qull
a few issues ago in the present day, the Red Lanterns/Empire
of Tears really do use blood to see the future/make
their prophecies. We also learn what will certainly be the
Red Lantern oath: "With Blood and Rage of Crimson Red,
Ripped from a Corpse so Freshly Dead, Together with Our
Hellish Hate, We'll Burn you All, that is your Fate!" A
sound, if chilling oath, though I'm not too impressed that
all the oaths for the Corps so far still use the same number
of syllables per line... let's mix it up a little bit,
folks. We already know there's no default Oath for the GLC
from the 80s when we saw all kinds of different and creative
GL oaths... why would entirely different Corps be
chained to the same damn template? I get the want to make
them different but somehow similar sounding, but it's just
needless.
We see Hal taking to
the air in his first flight for Carol, in a redux of Geoff's
backup story from last year's Sinestro Corps Special where
Sinestro first meets Hal and brings the ring to him from his
locker. It plays out the same, more or less. Only real
difference I can see is that Carol is in the tower, not on
the ground as she was in the Sin Special, and Hal doesn't
ask her out to dinner anymore with a sign in his cockpit
window... a tad disappointing. In GL #32 we get a bit of
what happens afterward with Hal initially confronting
Sinestro, then Sinestro rebuilding his jet and sending him
back on his way. Re-reading the rest of the Sin Special
backup, it seems that it actually takes us a little bit
further than this issue... we see Sinestro and Hal returning
to Abin's grave, Sinestro chastising Hal for not bringing
his ring along before apparently pledging to train him a bit
-- perhaps this will be in GL #33 in some form? I have to
imagine it would. It's also the same scene from "Rebirth"
#5... only difference I can see is a couple of lines of
dialogue from Sinestro: "The Guardians have deemed you
worthy enough to continue your training with me. Only a few
have been as honored. Stel, Arkkis Chummuck, Ken-To," right
after "And I am the Greatest Green Lantern" and "And who's
going to shell out the twenty million dollars for that jet?"
But we see Carol in between here, so we can safely assume
the dialogue still happens, just off-panel.
In the end, Hal lands
and Hector Hammond is running roughshod over all of Ferris
Air, crippling Carol and Hal with his mind/new powers. The
final panel, we see Atrocitus making a B-line for Coast
City.
Another fantastic
offering, I was very pleased this issue (and I did notice...
only two splash pages this issue, no wonder it feels like
such a full reading experience).
