While all of DC’s Absolute books have been taking some risks, Absolute Green Lantern feels like the book taking the biggest swings. That’s partly due to the slow-burn approach and the overall mystery of the Corps, but equally as important is how the characters have moved across the board and how they are interacting, especially in Absolute Green Lantern #4. There’s still a haze of revelations to come in Absolute Green Lantern, but what’s there is insanely rich and filled with hints at deeper Lantern lore, and it’s incredibly impressive how all of those various elements seem to fit together even in this early stage. Absolute Green Lantern is risking it all, and it’s the big franchise swing I didn’t realize I needed, but couldn’t be happier about now that it’s here.
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Al Ewing has spoken about his approach to marquee characters coming into the series, and Hal Jordan is the perfect embodiment of that in action. If your run in the mainline DC universe was pretty great, it’s going to be shaken up quite a bit this time around, and few are in as bad a place as Hal is at the moment. While he’s certainly an antagonist due to the entity that’s powering him, Ewing doesn’t remove the humanizing elements to his character, leaning into the grey that seems to power much of this world.
Ewing builds upon that foundation in issue #4 as Hal continues to evolve in both his abilities and as a conflicted antagonist, but equally impressive is that the series leans just as much into that grey regarding its lead hero. As the layers are pulled away from Jo’s journey to power, it becomes apparent that she’s just as conflicted and traumatized by the power she now possesses, just in a completely different way. No one in this world seems to be spared from this, and it will be interesting to see if after characters come to terms with this, they can find a way to relate to each other as well.
Nothing is what it seems at the beginning, and this extends to Abin Sur as well, who in many ways is becoming the central figure of the series. While Jo and Hal are clearly the leads, everything in their world and this bigger-than-life story actually revolves around Abin Sur’s actions and purpose, and as we learn in issue #4, even the things we think we know are actually not truly all that clear. Issue #4 changes your impression of Abin Sur substantially, and yet there are still all sorts of questions that demand answers. That demand for answers is a compelling part of the overall mix and keeps you moving forward.
More changes are coming too, as yet another well-known character enters the fray with a new look and very different attitude, and as someone who tends to get sick of this character in the mainline universe, I’m intrigued to see where this particular reinvention goes. The character changes in this series have been some of the boldest of the Absolute line, and we haven’t even tapped into the emotional spectrum of it all, either, which raises the hype meter for other characters tenfold.
The changes to characters are a place where the series shines, but it also shines in how it weaves in Lantern mythology and turns it on its head. The first two pages of this issue alone completely throw any assumptions I had about Hal’s power out the window, and the possibilities of that change are exciting, to say the least. Even Jo’s role as a Green Lantern isn’t what you may have assumed, and it’s this ability to subvert expectations right under your nose that continues to make the series one of the most surprising week to week.
Bringing this all together in truly out-of-this-world fashion is artist and colorist Jahnoy Lindsay and letterer Lucas Gattoni. Lindsay and Gattoni have taken internal exchanges between Hal and the entity that powers him and brought them to life in a truly creative way that conveys so much of what the entity wants and the toll it takes on its host. Then the team brings all the aforementioned elements of Lantern history and mythology crashing together in a gorgeous splash page, and once again, that brings new elements (and even emotions) to the characters directly involved. After four issues, it’s difficult to think of a better creative team for this series, especially as the ambitious nature of this series starts to become clearer.
Absolute Green Lantern does need to start answering some of these bigger questions soon, but the journey to this point has been incredibly rewarding, shifting direction and expectations consistently. The Green Lantern Corps and central idea feel as big and epic as they’ve ever been, and while we still don’t know all of the answers, that’s part of what makes this series so captivating in the first place, and I’m 100% along for the ride.
Rating: 4.5 out of 5
What did you think of Absolute Green Lantern #4? Let us know in the comments, and you can talk all things comics and Green Lantern with me on Bluesky @knightofoa!
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Image courtesy of Lucasfilm.
