Yes your eyes do not deceive you, there are two reviews dedicated to Green Lanterns Rebirth. It’s a new era for the Green Lantern mythos, as now we only have two monthly books to concern ourselves with. After over a year of Jessica Cruz under the influence of The Power Ring, she finally gets a chance to shine alongside her new partner Simon Baz. Now to usher in this new era for Green Lantern, as Sam Humphries (along with Geoff Johns) set the stage for the new dynamic duo.
Maybe it’s just my personal opinion but Rebirth should be about getting to the core of these beloved characters, and pushing forward into bold and new story lines. However upon opening the issue and the fact that the conflict they have set up for Cruz and Baz is centered around the emotional spectrum and eventually Atrocitus just has me rolling my eyes. I’ll fully admit that my dislike for this issue is the recycling of a concept that outstayed it’s welcome by 2010. From a narrative standpoint, Johns and Humphries do an excellent job of explaining the emotional spectrum. Although in contrast to that, if you’ve never read a Green Lantern comic before the last page suffers from the typical trope that you need to know who that person is. On the basis of being new reader friendly this book passes the test with flying colors, I’m just personally tired of the emotional spectrum.
Despite that there are aspects that I enjoyed and thankfully it centers around both Simon and Jessica. Focusing on Jessica for a second, I simply adore that she is an introverted person. Each of the other four Earth Lanterns have some bravado about them, so it’s refreshing to see someone who’s personality doesn’t feel similar to those around her. Even showing that she has a sister and her relationship with said sister breathes life into her world and character. On the flip side Simon Baz has had more opportunity for character development since he’s been around longer but I’ve personally haven’t read most of them.
Johns and Humphries give you enough information on Baz to understand his background, but not much can be done about his bland personality. Which leads me to the crux of why I enjoyed this issue so much, and that’s the interplay between Simon and Jessica. It’s borderline bickering siblings (pleased don’t make them hook up) and it makes it endearing to see both struggle with the responsibilities of being Earth’s primary Green Lanterns. Their dynamic will make me stick around for the long haul and not the emotional spectrum.
Ending on a negative note, the art by Ed Benes was just plain awful for each segment he penciled. Benes’s art has never been known for his line work, but each panel and sequentially each page made characters look vastly different and it was to jarring for me to notice. His storytelling was good, but the lack of consistency between pages just made it a trudge to look at for most of the issue. It doesn’t help that Benes had Ethan Van Sciver, which by comparison makes Benes art look even worse.
The art and the involvement of the emotional spectrum have somewhat killed my initial enthusiasm for this upcoming series, however seeing how Baz and Cruz interact with each other gives me hope that it balance out the problems I had going foward. A rough start,but there’s always a silver lining.
Green Lanterns Rebirth #1 earns a 3/5