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Showcase Presents: Green Lantern #5
Showcase Presents: Green Lantern, Vol. 5
Over 500 pages of classic super hero adventure are collected in this valuepriced volume! Green Lantern – a.k.a. test pilot Hal Jordan – battles evil as a member of the star-spanning Green Lantern Corps. This new Showcase volume collects the famed stories by writer Dennis O’Neil and artist Neal Adams that teamed Green Lantern with Green Arrow, in which the two heroes face issues of the day including women’s rights, political corruption, religious intolerance and more — all while battling evil.
496 pages, Paperback
First published May 3, 2011
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81 people want to read
About the author
Dennis O'Neil
1,284 books276 followers
Dennis "Denny" O'Neil
was a comic book writer and editor best known for his work for Marvel Comics and DC Comics from the 1960s through the 1990s, and Group Editor for the Batman family of titles until his retirement.
His best-known works include Green Lantern/Green Arrow and Batman with Neal Adams, The Shadow with Michael Kaluta and The Question with Denys Cowan. As an editor, he is principally known for editing the various Batman titles. From 2013 unti his death, he sat on the board of directors of the charity The Hero Initiative and served on its Disbursement Committee.
His best-known works include Green Lantern/Green Arrow and Batman with Neal Adams, The Shadow with Michael Kaluta and The Question with Denys Cowan. As an editor, he is principally known for editing the various Batman titles. From 2013 unti his death, he sat on the board of directors of the charity The Hero Initiative and served on its Disbursement Committee.
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
April 7, 2014
one of the greatest comic book regular issue runs ever collected, it was pretty fantastic.
I did really like the use of "modern day social issues" to drive a super hero team-up like Green Lantern and Green Arrow. It doesn't make it a good story necessarily to have issues about race, or about the environment, or drug use, but they are a great way of challenging the emotional status quo for one of the most directly status quo heroes, Green Lantern with his directives from intergalactic bosses.
The stories themselves are written well by Dennis "Denny" O'Neil. The use a lot of misdirection to motivate the action. Sometimes G. Lantern is a jerk, sometimes G. Arrow is, sometimes Hal Jordan even gets in touch with his emotions, it varies the flow to not make it feel like a generic issue to issue everything works out.
They cancelled the best part, the GL/GA magazine, after just 13 issues, he becomes a back-up story in Flash magazine. Those stories are good, mostly in the use of serialization, giving you a crazy cliffhanger every month or so because you only have 8-10 pages of a full story each time.
Neal Adams did some great artwork, as he does what he typically does, challenge himself with big splash panels and covers, things blowing up and outburst of emotions. The people who took over when GL became a back up story in Flash magazine did pretty good, mostly mimicking Adams's style. It's pretty easy to make a good drawing when the story demands people fly across space, punch entitities, and otherwise be cosmic.
This was a great read!
5/5
I did really like the use of "modern day social issues" to drive a super hero team-up like Green Lantern and Green Arrow. It doesn't make it a good story necessarily to have issues about race, or about the environment, or drug use, but they are a great way of challenging the emotional status quo for one of the most directly status quo heroes, Green Lantern with his directives from intergalactic bosses.
The stories themselves are written well by Dennis "Denny" O'Neil. The use a lot of misdirection to motivate the action. Sometimes G. Lantern is a jerk, sometimes G. Arrow is, sometimes Hal Jordan even gets in touch with his emotions, it varies the flow to not make it feel like a generic issue to issue everything works out.
They cancelled the best part, the GL/GA magazine, after just 13 issues, he becomes a back-up story in Flash magazine. Those stories are good, mostly in the use of serialization, giving you a crazy cliffhanger every month or so because you only have 8-10 pages of a full story each time.
Neal Adams did some great artwork, as he does what he typically does, challenge himself with big splash panels and covers, things blowing up and outburst of emotions. The people who took over when GL became a back up story in Flash magazine did pretty good, mostly mimicking Adams's style. It's pretty easy to make a good drawing when the story demands people fly across space, punch entitities, and otherwise be cosmic.
This was a great read!
5/5
March 27, 2017
The stories in this book feature a Green Lantern subject to personal and professional difficulties. Hal Jordan has lost his job and is down to his last couple hundred dollars. His overseers have stripped him of some of his power, leading to struggles as he fights the villains that are as strong and ruthless as ever. At times, the flaws in Green Lantern’s persona are so prevalent that they interfere with the story. After all, one must have great confidence if you are to protect the Earth from menaces of cosmic origin.
The opening stories have Green Lantern battling alongside Green Arrow and occasionally the Black Canary, the big-busted female hero that fights in boots with heels. The once wealthy Oliver Queen has been reduced to a pauper and the two heroes whose names begin with “Green” are constantly bickering, again to the detriment of the stories. Having heroes with flaws does make the stories stronger and more interesting, but once again it takes a lot of confidence and courage to be a hero and take on the type of villains that these heroes must fight.
One feature of the Green Lantern stories that I have always enjoyed and are a fundamental component of these stories is the devices he makes with his ring when he is fending off attacks from his opponents. For example, when he is transporting Green Arrow and Black Canary, he creates a flying sofa. Great imagination exhibited there.
Personal problems for heroes make better stories, as long as they are not overdone. In this case they are.
The opening stories have Green Lantern battling alongside Green Arrow and occasionally the Black Canary, the big-busted female hero that fights in boots with heels. The once wealthy Oliver Queen has been reduced to a pauper and the two heroes whose names begin with “Green” are constantly bickering, again to the detriment of the stories. Having heroes with flaws does make the stories stronger and more interesting, but once again it takes a lot of confidence and courage to be a hero and take on the type of villains that these heroes must fight.
One feature of the Green Lantern stories that I have always enjoyed and are a fundamental component of these stories is the devices he makes with his ring when he is fending off attacks from his opponents. For example, when he is transporting Green Arrow and Black Canary, he creates a flying sofa. Great imagination exhibited there.
Personal problems for heroes make better stories, as long as they are not overdone. In this case they are.
Want to read
June 22, 2017Includes all the Neal Adams Green Lantern / Green Arrow issues plus the Green Lantern backup stories from The Flash 220, 221, 223, 224, 226, 227, 228, 230, 231, 233, 234, 237, 238, 240, 241, 242, 243, 245, 246.
As far as I know the Flash Green Lantern backup stories have not been reprinted anywhere else. But I suspect they may be in the prospective Green Lantern The Bronze Age Omnibus which has not yet been solicited.
As far as I know the Flash Green Lantern backup stories have not been reprinted anywhere else. But I suspect they may be in the prospective Green Lantern The Bronze Age Omnibus which has not yet been solicited.
May 2, 2019
Classic Green Lantern with lots of art by the Great Neal Adams. What more can I say?
May 28, 2011
This volume of the Green Lantern reprints opens with the 13 issue run where writer Denny O'Neil and artist Neil Adams attempted the make the series socially relevant to the issues of the day by adding Green Arrow to the series and making him from a generic Batman rip-off to the big time liberal he's been ever since. O'Neil often brought his left-leaning views to his writing (other volumes of other series show he inserts environmental concerns into his stories), so here where it's outright expected of him, the results are...mixed. The narration is often about a subtle as a sledgehammer, ham-fisted, overly fond of declaring everything that happens either the "most dramatic" or "strangest" whatever of all time, and it often helps that whoever is opposing whatever it is Green Arrow is railing against is an actual criminal and not just someone with a different point of view (my favorite is the mine owner who runs the poor mine town has, in fact, hired Nazi war criminals for his security forces), and if old GL foes like Sinestro or Black Hand happen to be there, so much the better. The final issue before the book was canceled had the two hard-traveling heroes meeting a (literally) Jesus-like anti-pollution hardliner. The Biblical references couldn't have been less apparent, from the cover to the crucifixion.
For the strengths, though, the Speedy-is-on-drugs two-parter had some good ideas, namely in making the blowhard Green Arrow to be actually in the wrong for once. Carol Ferris returns briefly as Hal Jordan's love interest (before he, in a fit of anger, does something that maybe bankrupts her company, hard to say, the plotline and the character do not return in the remaining stories). The GL series was canceled after that, and Hal's adventures went on to be back-up stories in The Flash's book for a period where Green Arrow was written out and the adventures became more pure science fiction adventures, with the introduction of Itty, and the moralizing became less frequent.
For the strengths, though, the Speedy-is-on-drugs two-parter had some good ideas, namely in making the blowhard Green Arrow to be actually in the wrong for once. Carol Ferris returns briefly as Hal Jordan's love interest (before he, in a fit of anger, does something that maybe bankrupts her company, hard to say, the plotline and the character do not return in the remaining stories). The GL series was canceled after that, and Hal's adventures went on to be back-up stories in The Flash's book for a period where Green Arrow was written out and the adventures became more pure science fiction adventures, with the introduction of Itty, and the moralizing became less frequent.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews