Keep in mind that the Lantern has a long and complex history...
The first Green Lantern here on Earth was Alan Scott, back in the post-WWII era. He had stumbled upon a mystical green railway lantern and ring; when charged, he had basically the same powers as the outer-space Lanterns, except that his sole weakness was wood. (Later, the writers decided that the mystic lantern was carved from an object called the Starheart; Alan found it necessary to merge with the Starheart to save the world, and emerged with his youth restored and his power now inherent in himself rather than his ring.)
Next up was Hal Jordan, a test pilot who crashed an experimental aircraft when it collided with a disabled spacecraft. Its occupant, Abin Sur, the member of the Green Lantern Corps responsible for this sector of the Galaxy, died shortly after the crash; he passed his ring on to Hal, as the primary requirement was for the ring's bearer to have no fear, and the ring detected none in Hal's mind. Hal then learned that an ancient race of little blue guys, the Guardians of Oa, had built a massive power battery on their homeworld. It would distribute its power through subspace conduits to lesser batteries, shaped vaguely like lanterns; these lanterns could then provide a 24-hour charge of energy to their rings. The rings would produce energy fields, of power and variety limited only by the user's imagination and will, and invariably colored green. These energy fields were powerless only against the color yellow.
Later, two more humans were selected by rings to join the Corps - Guy Gardner, a former social worker who had suffered organic brain damage that made him far more aggressive than before, and John Stewart, a Vietnam veteran and former Marine. Gardner eventually wound up having his ring taken back, followed by acquiring a yellow ring from the Weaponeers of Quard, occupants of a mirror, "antimatter" universe (not true antimatter, or the ring and Guy would have mutually reacted and been destroyed). Gardner eventually surrendered this ring as well, after learning that he had somehow acquired DNA from a species that could form weapons of their own bodies. He adventured for a time as Warrior, then retired and opened a theme restaurant in Metropolis. Later he rejoined the Corps, as an Honor Lantern, instructing new recruits.
John Stewart served honorably as a member of the Corps until the Parallax Incident. During the fight, he was injured, and became convinced he was paralyzed. It wasn't until several years later that he learned that his paralysis was in fact psychosomatic, born of his guilt at not stopping Parallax before Jordan became infected. He currently works with the Justice League.
Hal Jordan was offworld when Mongul and one of the false Supermen destroyed his home of Coast City during the Death of Superman storyline; when he returned, he began to lose contact with reality. He used his ring to restore his mental image of the city - which would only work for 24 hours at a time, of course. In desperation, he flew to Oa, seeking to absorb the entire Central Battery into his ring to overcome the time limit. He fought the entire Corps, killing many of them in the process, then vanished into the Battery, emerging later as the almost all-powerful Parallax. (Turned out that he was possessed at the time by a being known as Parallax, which lived on fear. In the "emotional spectrum" of the Guardians, the color of fear was yellow, which is why the rings didn't work on it.) The last surviving Guardian, Ganthet, took the last remaining ring to Jordan's homeworld, where the ring selected a young artist named Kyle Rayner. Rayner learned the powers of his ring, the Omega Ring, and was instrumental in both the defeat of Parallax and the restoration (and in some cases resurrection) of the Corps. He managed to use the Omega Ring to remake both the Central Battery and the normal rings; since the new Battery no longer contained the fear-being Parallax, the rings are no longer vulnerable to yellow. Rayner later became the energy-being Ion, a role he is still learning to contain, and works alongside the Corps, but separately.
Jordan died while ridding himself of Parallax and saving Earth, but later was restored to life from the Source, a godlike power occasionally accessed by the native of the planet New Genesis. The Guardians restored him to active status; he is currently working to regain the trust of the other Lanterns.
I have to confess, I lost the ability to read this series about the time the Red Lantern storyline was starting. I can't afford to buy the books, the comic store I was browsing at is closed for renovations, and I can't even download an illegal torrent because my computer is dead and I won't download something like that onto anyone else's system.
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Sodium is a metal that reacts explosively when exposed to water. Chlorine is a gas that'll kill you dead in moments. Together they make my fries taste good.
13 Mar 2009, 1:58 pm
s and to " fully " follow this I think you have to buy two titles and a special and <sigh>
