Comics! Green Lantern #8

Green Lantern #8

Writer: Geoff Johns
Pencils: Doug Mahnke
Inks: MArk Irwin, Ketih Champagne, Christian Alamy & Doug Mahnke

The Solicitation
"Secret of the Indigo Tribe" Part 2! On the Indigo homeworld, Hal Jordan and Sinestro are trapped, powerless and on the run – with the entire Indigo Tribe in hot pursuit! Their situation grows even more dire when we learn the Indigos' deadly secret! Plus: Why Indigo-1 is so interested in Hal's predecessor, Abin Sur?

Preview

The Story
Remember last issue that was pretty much a recap of all previous knowledge of the Indigo tribe? This is part 2 of that, with crazy Hal Jordan escaping from jail hijinks.

Seriously, that "secret" that the solicitation says is revealed? Nada. I don't see one here.

We start off with Sinestro fighting back becoming an Indigo Tribe member. Then we flip to Hal Jordan talking to Black Hand, which deserves a WTF stamp. We know that the Indigo Tribe can harness the power of all the users if they are within range of them. Before they were never able to access willpower, or so they said. Black Hand does just that, and Hal Jordan takes the moment to put his ring that Sinestro forged him against Black Hand's forehead to charge the ring.

A couple of problems with that action there. First off, I thought that when Sinestro's forged rings ran out of power they just disappeared, which means that Jordan should have no ring. Let's skip that point. I also didn't think that Jordan could power up the ring by placing it on Black Hand's forehead and shouting his oath, mostly because I thought that only Sinestro could power up the rings he forged. And just what does it mean to access a part of the emotional spectrum? Does that mean you can charge the rings or that you can just use the power? It isn't really explained and it seems to be built based upon what Johns needs to get Hal out of a situation.

At least when Hal powers up the ring with Black Head's forehead, it doesn't fully charge the ring and the ring doesn't have all of its abilities. So now that Jordan is out on the run, he comes across a statue of Abin Sur. I guess this is when the big secret is revealed that Abin Sur saved all of those in the Indigo Tribe. That he created them. Honestly, I thought that was already common knowledge, unless that's just me being able to read it online somewhere and not in the comic.

The final page is a picture of Sinestro in Indigo Tribe set up. Behind him is the reflection of who he was before he became a member of the tribe. The same goes for all the other members of the tribe in the picture.

This issue just disappointed me. This seems to crawl at baby steps to try and tell us the story of the Indigo Tribe. Honestly, I would think that by the second issue we would get some sort of new information.

I really didn't like Johns' way of getting Jordan out of trouble in this issue. I just rolled my eyes and wondered why. And then spend half the issue dealing with Jordan and his escape. Bah.

The Art
The art is consistently good as per usual. The team of inkers on this one included the main artist himself. I must say that the opening sequence with Sinestro beating the member of the Indigo Tribe was awesome. Definitely had a creepy vibe to it.

Outside of that, most of the comic only had bars and lines for backgrounds throughout the rest of the issue. Made it feel very empty.

The Cover
Honestly, with the title boxes and everything, it just looks like Hal and Sinestro are running from some circular light behind them. The light source behind them definitely gives a subdued feeling with the rest of the cover, which matches the way of the Indigo Tribe.

Honestly, if the idea behind the two on the cover is that they are powerless and on the run, like the cover says, why are they in full costume? Wouldn't a fading costume or tattered costume give a better impression of that?

BTW, the cover I got does not match the cover here. The cover here looks much better. The cover I got has the Indigo Tribe symbol behind the two with some sort of ground thing that they are running on.

Grades
Words: 6/10
Pictures: 7/10
Recommend: Eh. Skippable middle part of the story. Next issue will be ok to pick up and skip this one.
Buy Next Issue: I guess. My retailer is only getting the Combo-Packs though. Hopefully I can get a copy of the regular edition next time because I don't want to pay $3.99 for this comic if it drops in quality every other month.

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