Green Lantern #29 – Review

By: Robert Venditti (writer), Billy Tan and Martin Coccolo (pencilers), Rob Hunter and Walden Wong (inkers), Alex Sinclair and Tony Avina (colors)

The Story: Hal Jordan marks a new era of openness and humility in his leadership style by commanding a planet to move for him.

The Review: After an intrusion by Supergirl and the Red Lanterns last month, Robert Venditti’s Green Lantern returns to the task at hand.

Perhaps it was his meeting with Guy, or maybe just the place and time, but Hal is finally beginning to grow into leadership. His move to assemble a war council is a baby step for him, but it’s the first major action as leader where he’s opened himself up and asked for help. Likewise, it’s a strong move for the series, which has been excessively, some would say obnoxiously, focused on Lantern Jordan since Geoff Johns rebooted it ten years ago.

It’s not that Hal isn’t a fun character, it’s just that very few comic characters can handle that prolonged attention without growing dull. Batman shares his comic with a small gaggle of sidekicks and, more often than not, lets his villains do the heavy lifting. With Sinestro gone, it’s about time that Hal’s regular supporting cast expanded beyond Kilowog and this proves that Venditti is serious about continuing his strides in that direction.

The one downside of this is that it means that Hal has to do something to back up his newfound conviction. The raid on Gwottle that takes up just under half the issue is perfectly serviceable but, aside from highlighting another one of Hal’s inner circle, it’s not terribly interesting. Venditti makes strides in bringing a sense of space-spanning action and galactic realpolitik to the series, but once we set down it feels like they’re in competition. It’s the sort of thing that lets the issue claim a significant battle sequence, but wouldn’t be missed if you skipped this issue.