Sinestro Corps. War part 1

Sinestro Corps. War part 1

Green Lantern: Sinestro Corps. Special, Green Lantern #21-22, Green Lantern Corps. #14-15, Tales of the Sinestro Corps. #1

Originally released in 2007

Written by Geoff Johns, Dave Gibbons, et al.

Art by Ethan Van Sciver, Ivan Reis, et al.

I've started the Sinestro Corps. War, and already, I find it difficult to have the proper perspective on how big of a deal this was for DC.  Before this, there was seemingly only the Green Lantern Corps. as far as intergalactic light-based organizations are concerned.  The Star Sapphire and Sinestro, from what I can tell, were more like independent entities (with Sinestro taking advantage of the weakness of the Green Lantern Ring, and the Star Sapphire being a galaxy-spanning parasite).

This event changed that, with Sinestro (as already established) slowly building up his own army of Yellow Lanterns in order to attack the Green Lanterns.  Soon, other colours of Lanterns followed - the Red Lanterns who embody rage, the Orange Lanterns (or rather, Orange Lantern) who embody greed, the Blue Lanterns who embody hope, and so on.  I'm more than a little surprised that this took over forty years for them to do, but it seems to open up so many doors from a story-telling perspective.

This crossover, where Sinestro attacks the Green Lanterns across the universe, is spread out over at least two different ongoing series, plus a one-off that starts the event and various individual issues that provide backstory for the event's key villains.  The main Green Lantern series focuses on the human Green Lanterns, particularly Hal Jordan.  Hal was once a student of Sinestro, but upon discovering that Sinestro was using his ring to enforce a tyrannical rule over his homeworld, he reported it to the Guardians of the Universe.  The Guardians, seemingly unaware of this beforehand, banished Sinestro from the Green Lanterns, and Sinestro has hated Hal ever since.

At the start of Geoff Johns' run on Green Lantern, it was established/retconned that when Hal Jordan went insane, started calling himself "Parallax", and decided to rewrite the timeline to his own liking, Hal was actually possessed by an ancient fear entity known as Parallax, who had been sealed in the Green Lantern's central power battery. (this also served as the explanation for why the Green Lantern Rings were weak to the colour yellow)  Now, Sinestro has called upon Parallax to possess the then-newest human Green Lantern, Kyle Rayner.

However, as the Sinestro Corps. special shows, Sinestro and Parallax aren't the organization's only heavy-hitters.  The Sinestro Corps. engage in a jailbreak, freeing Cyborg Superman and Superboy Prime (who isn't named in the comic itself - to my knowledge, a lawsuit prevented DC from acknowledging any version of Clark Kent as being Superboy), both of whom are working for Sinestro for their own ends.  Cyborg Superman is Hank Henshaw, whose backstory closely resembles the backstory of Reed Richards... except Henshaw's friends die horribly, Henshaw develops a grudge against Superman, and Henshaw desperately wants to die.

Superboy Prime, on the other hand, is from a universe where super-powered people only exist in comic books.  His parents gave him the name Clark Kent, seemingly as a joke, only for him to discover that he actually has superpowers, and he even meets Superman from the comics.  His world was, from what I can tell, destroyed during Crisis on Infinite Earths, and that caused him to turn bitter and homicidal. (I believe he's often used as a stand-in for whiny fans)

The last member of Sinestro's inner circle is the Anti-Monitor from Crisis on Infinite Earths, which definitely seems like a step up from everyone else in terms of threat level.  Green Lantern Rings and Kryptonians may be strong, but the Anti-Monitor is on a whole other level - in Crisis on Infinite Earths, he took the combined power of five separate universes and more or less shrugged it off.  It would be like if the Devil himself rose from the depths of Hell, arrived on Earth, and was content to work for a mid-level mob boss. (not "with", "for")  He's presumably only part of the Sinestro Corps. until he can destroy Earth, which was his goal in Crisis since Earth is the lynchpin of the multiverse, but it's weird to see him seemingly make himself subordinate to Sinestro.

As Hal faces off against Parallax, trying to free Kyle from its grip, the Green Lantern Corps. series focuses on how the rest of the Green Lanterns are faring throughout the universe. (it's not going well)  On Sinestro's home planet, its current Green Lantern, Soranik Natu, learns the hard way that the Green Lantern Rings can't be used for lethal force (and the rings shut down if they try), in contrast with Sinestro's forces, who have no such limitation.

In Green Lantern Corps. #15, the focus shifts to the battle for (and on) Mogo, a sentient planet that serves as a Green Lantern.  Mogo helps guide the Green Lantern Rings, so the Sinestro Corps. plan to kill/destroy Mogo, which would make it so Green Lantern Rings can't find new owners when the current holder dies.

What follows is, purely and simply, chaos, with hundreds of alien races on both sides battling to determine the fate of Mogo and the Green Lantern Corps.  The people behind this series clearly enjoyed the opportunity to design as many alien races as possible, and we get a good variety of them shown off here. (one Green Lantern is a box, while a Yellow Lantern is a squid)

It's a lot to take in, and I feel like I'll only fully appreciate it once I'm finished.  I found it easier to follow than Annihilation, likely due to the smaller number of factions involved.  There are a lot of characters on both sides, and with a handful of exceptions (the four human Lanterns, Kilowog, Mogo, and Sinestro's five core members), it's hard for me to know who's appeared before and who's been introduced for the first time.  As a result, the deaths of any Green Lanterns aren't as impactful as they could be, since I don't know if these are long-established characters or fan favourites who are getting killed off, or if they're characters who were introduced in this storyline to boost the body count.

Still, it seems like Geoff Johns had a long-term plan when writing this story - mentions are made of a Blackest Night prophecy, seemingly building towards the event where the dead are raised through Black Lantern Rings, and the existence of other Lantern Corps. is further implied with it being mentioned that Green is at the center of the spectrum.  At the moment, it feels like a roller coaster, moving so quickly that it's tough to take everything in, but I'm excited to see where this is all going.