Green Lantern: Rebirth #6

This one went out with a whimper. The big showdown with Parrallax was dull. We already know what the differences between the various Lanterns are. It wasn't necessary to have Jordan's voice-over point them out because Ethan Van Sciver did a fine job of drawing them. I like Geoff Johns' writing but he sometimes falls back on the thing Claremont used to do: Show something in a panel and then write words over the panel which baldly state exactly what it is we're looking at.

A lot of comics writers don't seem comfortable enough with the visual medium in which they are writing to let the pictures do the talking. My favorites writers are able to do this. They know when to use words and they know when to trust the artist. Warren Ellis has this down. Even Brian Bendis, one of the most talky writers to hit comics since Kevin Smith, often has sections where the dialogue and the pictures are telling different stories simultaneously. That's a good thing. Johns hasn't written "Well, here we are back in JLA headquarters" yet but he's come close.

This issue has characters acting "out of character" for no reason other than Johns needs it to happen. What the hell is with everyone being out to take Batman down a peg, lately? I don't mean the other characters, I mean the writers. I'm not one of those "OMG Batman is unbeatable!!" types but, damn, why's everybody gotta punk on the caped crusader? That whole confrontation between the JLA and the Lanterns was useless. It didn't move the story along. In fact, it stalled it. There was no reason for them to show up in this issue.

There were good things about this issue. The art was great. I love Van Sciver's interpretations of the various Lantern's powers and he really handles the action well. The interactions between the Lanterns were good, especially Gardner and Stewart. Also, Jordan is written consistently for the most part and I come out of this series with a good sense of why he is worthy of one of the most powerful weapons in the universe.

Summary: This was a disappointing finale to a good series. I don't know if Johns didn't know how to end it or what but there just wasn't much there. I am a big fan of the Green Lantern Corps. I have always loved the legends surrounding them.Rebirth wasn't the best thing I've ever read but Johns did a good job of bringing Jordan back. Everything fits well as long as you accept that this is a comic and some things are just gonna be goofy. As long as the goofy is internally consistent I'll let it slide.

I'm going to get Green Lantern #1 (too bad Van Sciver's not drawing it) and I'll remain optimistic. Johns groks the old-school heroes and anything with green power rings in it gets extra points from me. We'll see.