The Real Question Is: Who's DUMB Enough to Accept a Star Sapphire Ring?

An interesting discussion over at Green Lantern Butts Forever got me thinking: who is Star Sapphire material?

Kyle loves easily, no doubt. He gets into relationships easily, and he gets serious about them very easily. It seems like a long time to us, but in DCU time, Kyle has really only been around for... three or four years, maybe? And look how many "serious" girlfriends he's had during that time. It's almost Hal-like, except of course that we know that Kyle loves and Hal... well, Hal usually just lusts, but I don't deny that sometimes he thinks he's in love.

And what does Kyle do when he loses a girlfriend? He moves pretty quickly on to the next -- which is good for us, because it means he moves beyond the angst for a while and is happy again.

Now, I'm not saying that it means he doesn't really love. I really think he does. But it's starting to look to me like Kyle needs an emotional crutch to prop himself up with. He admits to Soranik that he's in love with the idea of being in love, which I think is incredibly perceptive character interpretation on Peter Tomasi's part. And there's nothing wrong with that. But damn, he's a needy little artist, isn't he? And he tends to be a little selfish in his grief when bad things happen to those he loves. Not just his girlfriends, either -- look what he did when Terry got beat up! And when his mother died.

I don't think it's a coincidence that Kyle is falling in love with Soranik now, at this particular moment. It hasn't been long since he lost Jade, then he lost his mom, and he feels responsible for killing Jack T. Chance... and almost immediately after he finally has some time on his hands after the Sinestro Corps War, what does he do? Start flirting with Soranik.

Kyle's a sweetie. He feels emotion strongly (which IMHO makes him a better candidate for wielding various other rings than Hal, who doesn't seem to feel anything very deeply or for very long), and he has a lot of love to give. But I also think he's more of an emotional mess than the other three Lanterns combined right now. He's needy and sort of high maintenance... and you know, I can't imagine Soranik putting up with a needy boyfriend for very long. She has a lot of her daddy in her -- she's generally pretty no-nonsense when it comes to everything except her ring, and while she has infinite amounts of patience to complete difficult tasks, she doesn't seem to have a lot of patience for people.

Then again, I might be misjudging her completely, as she's been pretty supportive of Kyle's giant "I'M SO SAD" finger-painting project so far. It's still very early in their relationship, though, so maybe she's still got on some rose-colored glasses?

I really hope they're not setting Kyle up to be a Star Sapphire by rushing him into this relationship with Soranik. If something happens to her, he'll certainly have great loss in his heart because that's how he always takes tragedy. Does the fact that it happens all the time make it less genuine? No, I don't think so... but then we have Guy to think about.

Kyle and Guy are actually a lot alike in that they feel emotion very strongly and take loss very hard, but they deal with it in different ways. Kyle moves on to the next girl, because like I said, he seems to need to be in a relationship to be emotionally fulfilled. They save him from depression.

Guy behaves a little more strangely. Think about it. You'd think that a man like Guy, who makes no secret of his appreciation for women and isn't shy about flirting with them (sometimes inappropriately), would spend more time with one on his arm, or in his bed, as the case may be. But after Tora died, he stayed pretty lonely. He had that one relationship with Bea, but Bea was really only a step away from Tora, and she was certainly someone who could identify with his grief. I think, deep down, they really felt something for each other, but I don't think that Guy would have gone for her initially if she had been some other random person rather than Tora's best friend, because he wasn't ready to turn his back on Tora completely even though she was dead.

Guy loves easily, too, but he doesn't fall in love easily, nor does he let go of it easily. He loves deeper than Kyle does, maybe because, for him, love has never been easy to gain. Kyle is a loveable sort of guy -- hell, even Batman likes him, and that says a lot! Guy, on the other hand, has always struggled with rejection. His parents loved him second-best, he did everything on his own and had no one to rely on but himself, Kari shacked up with Hal just when Guy needed her most, Hal and the other Lanterns turned their backs on him when he finally got his ring and got into their little club (granted, it was because he was brain damaged and obnoxious), the Justice League couldn't stand him, tried to kick him out, and actually rejoiced when he lost his ring, etc.

For Guy, love is something you have to work for, and something you fail to achieve more often than not. When you find it, it's rare and special, and something you don't let go of unless someone pries it out of your cold dead fingers. When Tora died, Guy wasn't emotionally devastated the way Kyle always is, because Guy is a survivor first and foremost. If there's one thing he does know how to do, it's how to keep going even when it hurts so bad that you don't want to. But he certainly felt the loss badly enough that he didn't really bother trying to move on to another woman who wasn't deeply connected to Tora for a long time. Letting go was a struggle.

And obviously he never really did manage it. When Tora came back and he finally got back together with her, the first thing he did was pour his heart out to her without shame or hesitation. And then he wanted to move their relationship up to the next level (though perhaps not quite the level Tora had in mind) the very next time they got together. Losing her again would certainly leave great loss in his heart.

So could Guy or Kyle wield a Star Sapphire ring? I think they both could. I think the difference would be in whether or not they accepted the ring when it showed up to claim them. Guy, even in his moment of great loss, would probably be a lot more skeptical of a violet ring. He's a pro at dealing with pain by now, and he doesn't look for a quick fix in the form of something that he already doesn't trust. However, it would be perfectly in character for Kyle to accept it, because that's what Kyle does -- he escapes, does ill-advised things, and desperately searches for something to fill that hole in his heart, which the violet ring promises it will do.

Then end result?

Kyle in a Star Sapphire man-thong and Guy slapping him in the face until he comes to his senses.

Things I Do With My Hands

I've been told by more than one person that they're surprised that I'm not a smoker, just because I'm constantly doing things with my hands. If there's a pen close by, I'm clicking it, if there's a pencil, I'm doodling, if there's a ruler, I'm slapping myself with it, if there's a ball, I'm tossing it around...

So maybe it's no surprise that I'm a creative person, just by virtue of the fact that I have to do something constructive with my hands so that I don't destroy the stuff around me! I think the whole reason I started writing is because I can't stand the sight of a blank piece of paper. I have to fill it with something -- either words or pictures -- and I like words better.

My muse has been on vacation lately, but these things go in cycles with me. If I'm not writing, it's a pretty safe bet that I'm obsessing over something else. I thought my very small readership here might be interested in seeing what I've been doing lately.

Behold my latest project!

Yes, that's Guy Gardner as Warrior, and I'm very proud of him. There are tons of very nice customs around on the internet, and lots of great customizers on the GLC message boards, and they inspired me to try some of my own. Guy isn't my first, actually, but he's my newest and I just finished him tonight.

Everybody knows that Guy gets all the Lantern ladies!

Guy is made from a random wrestling figure that I picked up at my local comic shop for the grand sum of one dollar, with a head from a Maximum Aggression Matt Striker figure,a nd lots of sculpey and painting! The head the original figure came with was sort of blah, and I don't ever want Guy to have a generic expression on his face, so when I saw this head I knew it had to be him. I love the grin.

Arisia is made from a Rising Stars Chandra body with a DC Direct Armory Nightwing (Power Girl in disguise) alternate head that had to have a lot of work done to make it fit properly on the neck. The choker is sculpted. And that tiny Lantern symbol on it is a pain in the butt to paint.

Soranik Natu is made from an Infinite Crisis Wonder Girl body with a JSA Hawkgirl head. Pretty straightforward custom.

And, if anyone was curious, here's a pic of my current Green Lantern toy collection! I have a couple more figures that aren't up yet -- the tiny statue of Sinestro that just came out, for one, and my old style bowlcut Guy Gardner is on the shelf below these with his JLI teammates.

The top shelf is obviously Hal versus Sinestro, with my favorite super homoerotic pic in the background. The bottom shelf is the rest of the Corps, minus the tiny figures (Minimates, etc.) which will no longer fit on the shelf.

Scattered among the mass-produced GLs on the bottom shelf are quite a few customs. Soranik Natu, Arisia, Brin (the little horse guy), Penn Maricc, Sodam Yat, Star Sapphire Miri Riam and Morro are all customized by me. Vath Sarn, Charlie Vickers, Evil Star, Graf Toren, and Gleen are by Last Galaxy. Arkiss Chummuck and Katma Tui are by an unknown artist -- I won them on Ebay a while back and can't recall the customizer's name. If anyone is interested in seeing better shots of any of them, let me know -- I know they're hard to pick out in the pic here.

I'm working on several more at the moment. Probably next to be finished will be Karu-Sil, Emerald Twilight Sinestro, and Maxwell Lord!

I'm trying to resist the urge to make a "Max shoots Ted" diorama, since I also have a nice Blue Beetle figure now.

Why I Love Soranik Natu... Um, I Mean, Patrick Gleason.

I don't hate any of the "regular" GL artists. I love Ivan Reis's work and will miss him greatly. Philip Tan's current run on GL has been okay -- not bad, but I think his beautiful pencils suffer a lot from the comic book coloring process. I am not a huge fan of Ethan Van Sciver, not because his artwork is bad or anything like that, but it just doesn't do anything special for me.

But there's a lot of dislike for Patrick Gleason on various message boards that I frequent, which makes me sad. I love Gleason's art!

I realize that he has a bit of a quirky style that seems to be one of those "either you like it or you don't" styles. Occasionally there have been panels that seem a little off to me, but overall, I love his style and I love his work. Yet there seem to be quite a few fans who don't care for it, even going so far as to say that his art is ruining an otherwise good book.

I suppose I should be grateful at least that they recognize what a good book GLC is, when too many people are overlooking it in favor of the main GL book (which has been hit and miss for me this year). Peter Tomasi has been writing a dynamite team book, blending the Blackest Night plot elements in with the other story threads seamlessly, and making me care about every single Green Lantern on the page. It's no secret that Guy is my favorite GL, and he hasn't had much to do lately, so it's a testament to the creative team's abilities that I'm still enjoying the book so much even though my favorite character is taking a bit of a backseat right now. And I think that Gleason's art is a big part of my enjoyment, too.

So while combing my back issues for examples of why I love his art so much, I came to a realization. I already knew that I love the way he draws Guy -- tons of personality in every panel he appears in! -- but you know who else looks absolutely yummy under Gleason's hand?

Yes, Soranik Natu is both beautiful and adorable, isn't she? There are a ton of characters in this book, ranging from a (soon-to-be-undead) fly to a lizard-man to a planet to God-knows-what, and all of them look good, but Natu's design is just wonderful! I love the "I'm a professional" short hair, and the costume that's both modern and very classy. I love the facial expressions he gives her -- ranging from "tired" to "Love you, Kyle!" to "I'M GONNA KICK YOUR ASS!". I love the way he uses her hair to show her current condition, like above, where it's all messy and kind of flat because she's cute and tired. When she means business, it's all spiky. How many artists actually show their characters' hair in disarray? Not nearly enough, in my opinion.




What a snarl! You'll note that here, and in other close-ups, it seems that Soranik has violet eyes. Hmm, I had never noticed until now.

Determined pout.

I think I have a girlcrush.

And as for Mr. Gleason? There's only one thing I don't like about him: he doesn't do nearly enough conventions, so I might never get those dozen convention sketches and autographs that I want!

Back From the Con...

Back from North Carolina, and happily carting in loads of stuff that I bought at HeroesCon 2009 I've been to a lot of cons, both larger and smaller than this one, and I've attended HeroesCon nearly every year since 1992, but I have to gush about how amazing it was this year because of Blackest Night.

The big question for me on Saturday morning (I skipped Friday and visited friends instead) was: which of my geeky comic t-shirts should I wear? In the end, I decided that I was feeling greedy and wore my Orange Lantern shirt, and I'm glad I did. HeroesCon was like one giant War of Light! I've never seen so many Lantern shirts in one place before. Every time I looked, there was someone else: Green Lanterns, Red Lanterns, Blue Lanterns, Black Lanterns! The place was just bursting with GL pride! All weekend long, I was hearing "Hey, nice shirt!" and saying the same to other folks. Some people really got into it, too: more than once, someone with an Orange Lantern shirt grabbed something I was looking at and said "MINE!", then we'd both laugh and go our separate ways. I saw two different people actually wearing a full Green Lantern costume, and when two guys in Blue Lantern shirts walked up to one of them, he looked at his ring and said "Power levels 200 percent! Thanks!". Probably half a dozen people stopped me to ask me what the hell was up with all these rainbow t-shirts, and then of course I had to explain it to them. I'm almost positive that the single vendor who was smart enough to stock these shirts at the con probably sold a ton of them to people who didn't even know what they were for and just wanted to get in on the weirdness. (For my part, I already had Orange, Indigo, and both the Sinestro Corps shirts, and I finally picked up the Blue and Red shirts here, but they sold out of Black and Star Sapphire on Friday! Curses!) It was a Lantern-fan's paradise, and I can only imagine how awesome SDCC will be for those who get to go.

I also attended the DC Nation panel on Saturday, which Ethan Van Sciver happened to be a part of. Obviously they couldn't tell us much about Blackest Night, but Ethan did tease us with the knowledge that he's supposed to be designing a very important Black Lantern character for the cover of Blackest Night #4. The entire panel seemed very excited about the event, and we also got to see (from a distance) the first issue of Wednesday Comics, which seems very cool. It actually folds out to resemble a newspaper! The possibility of an Aquaman: Rebirth was discussed (Martian Manhunter and Firestorm Rebirth ideas were also bandied about), but Ethan was very clear about the fact that right now he and Geoff are concerned solely with GL and Flash, and there weren't any plans for anything else yet. Someone asked what was going to happen to Bart Allen, and the answer was "Flash: Rebirth is going to make you very happy."

My favorite moment, though, was when a guy sitting a few rows back from me asked if there might be a possibility of another ongoing Guy Gardner series. They wouldn't answer us with a yea or nay, but Ethan said (I'm paraphrasing from memory here, hope I don't totally misquote him) that everyone knows that Green Lantern is red-hot right now, and it's still going to be huge coming out of Blackest Night, and "two Green Lantern books aren't enough".

Now of course I'd buy a Guy solo book in a heartbeat, but it doesn't really make much sense to give him one considering that he (sort-of) stars in GLC. So even if that doesn't pan out, I'm still stoked about the idea that Ethan, at least, seems to think that a third GL book of some sort would be a good idea. I'd love an ongoing Quarterly like they used to have, or perhaps even a monthly tales of the GLC in the same vein.

Heck, at this point I'd read an ongoing title featuring the other Corps (or whatever is left of the characters at the end of Blackest Night even if the other Corps end up collapsing).

The Redemption of Sinestro?

Originally posted by me on the Green Lantern Corps Message Board in response to a topic about whether or not we might see Sinestro "redeemed" in the aftermath of Blackest Night (the idea was that maybe we would find out that he was possessed by an entity all along):

I realize I'm in the minority here, but I wouldn't mind seeing Sinestro redeemed in some way. The problem is that no matter how it was done, it would just feel too contrived. As someone said, he was created to be a bad guy, and I'm not sure anyone could ever accept an alternate explanation for his behavior. And it would only be a matter of time before another writer came along and decided the whole thing was stupid and retconned the retcon so that he was really evil all along, after all.

So yeah, I don't think it would work. :(

I desperately want to see some stories about Sinestro when he was a rookie GL. It's not really fair that we only know him as the maniac he is now because we have no way to compare (and no, just saying "Oh, he was the greatest Green Lantern at one time" doesn't really give us a clear picture of the man he used to be). Was he ever young and hopeful and gung-ho to make a difference in the universe... sort of like a rookie cop who later becomes jaded and cynical? Only instead of giving up and becoming numb, he decided he could do it better his way? Or was he always just a power-hungry jerk with phenomenal will?

One of the few things I like about Emerald Twilight is Sinestro's narration before he appears to fight Hal. If I recall correctly, there's a part where he's talking about all the things you do as a GL, and then one day you start to ask yourself "What has this ring done for me?". That's a very natural response to living a dangerous life serving others, I think. Power alone is enough to corrupt, but the temptation must be even worse when you're not just powerful -- you're putting your neck on the line every single day. And people being what they are, the public probably comes across as a bunch of ungrateful wretches most of the time.

I'm actually surprised that more GLs haven't gone bad. Maybe none have been as delusional, or had the will to be as powerful, as Sinestro, but I suspect that more than one GL out there uses his power for personal gain in small ways.

It has also occurred to me that we don't know anything about how Korugar was run before Sinestro took control of it. It's all relative. I mean, think about it this way (and I realize this is a super over-simplification of the Civil War, but bear with me in my metaphor here): if the south had won the American Civil War, what do you suppose the history books would say about Abraham Lincoln? If you try to make sweeping changes to a society too quickly, or before it's ready to accept them, you're reviled.

So what if the status quo on Korugar was something like America two hundred years ago, and Sinestro's "despotism" was in taking control of the government and freeing the slaves, giving women the vote, and making it illegal to put orphans to work for twelve-hour days in factories? Sure, he's still a dictator and it was still wrong (and definitely against GL rules) to use/abuse his power to take control, but it does change the perspective a little.

I'm not saying any of that is true or even an option or anything -- I just like to look at things from every possible angle. And either way, he's still a mass murderer and terrorist, so none of that would wipe it all clean.

Sorry, Sin. I love you, but you're still dirty.

Not Much Happening Today

Lacey Fiddlesticks is sick. She was sniffling a little last night, and today when I came home she was lying on my bed wheezing and sneezing and just generally being snuffly. I'm sure it's nothing serious -- seems to just be a cold. I'm holding her, and if she isn't any better by Monday, I'll take her to the vet. And her eighth birthday is this week, too!

Casting rumblings: Green Lantern is currently slated for release on December 17th 2010, and a couple of sites have reported that WB has offered the role of Hal Jordan to Chris Pine. It may or may not be true, and he may or may not take the part, but I have mixed feelings about him as Hal. For one thing, he's going to be playing a young James T. Kirk in Star Trek, which is a pretty similar role to Hal. Think about it -- they're both young, handsome, rebellious men whose fathers died doing something heroic, both end up joining an intergalactic peacekeeping force, both end up taking over when their predecessor dies, and both become big heroes who dig alien chicks. But I think I was hoping for a casting choice that seemed a little less obvious. I don't want people to look at Hal and think Kirk.

And you know, I was already calling those random Green Lanterns who show up in background panels "red shirts" because you just know they're there for cannon fodder. Geoff Johns sure does love to kill him some Lanterns.

I'm dying to find out who gets all the roles, though. Hopefully we'll find out soon, because they're supposed to start filming in September!

Why Hal and Sinestro Should Not Play With Pointy Objects

I am an Ebay fanatic. And I also have a love for knick-knacks and quirky things, and a certain few searches that I do every day. So yeah, I'm one of those strange people who, if I see that someone is selling, say, a Green Lantern shotglass, I will buy it in a heartbeat. (Yes, I have a Green Lantern shotglass. Two different ones, actually.) I like art, too. I go to conventions mostly for the character sketches, and I don't mind if they're done by artists that no one has heard of because I like seeing different interpretations of characters. So when I'm searching for my favorite characters on Ebay and come across art of them that I've never seen before, I usually decide that I have to have it.

I really liked the look of this particular print, so I bid on it and won it a few weeks ago. It's signed by the artist, who is someone I've never heard of, and I was not disappointed by it when I actually got it in the mail. It's beautiful in real life -- the photo doesn't do it justice at all. The colors are gorgeous, the details are much more vivid, and the stars in the background seem to sparkle. I love it and would have gladly paid far more than the mere few dollars that I did.

But you know what I like best about it?

The unintentional homoeroticism.

Observe (and forgive me for using the pic from Ebay -- my scanner isn't working and I don't have a digital camera):

Okay, okay. When you actually see the real print, you realize that they're crossing swords down there, and that Hal's is a simple longsword like something a fantasy knight would use, while Sinestro's is more like a rapier with a complex hilt whose details you can't see in this small picture. I really appreciate those picky details, because those are appropriate sword choices considering the way the two of them think. This whole picture is full of interesting symbolism like that -- from the really obvious choice of bird and snake to the way Hal is bracing himself with his other hand and has taken a defensive posture while Sinestro is having no difficulty attacking while using just one.

But still... every time I look at this, the gutter-minded twelve-year-old deep inside me can't help but giggle.