Green Lantern: Emerald Knights Review
When it comes to comic book fanboys, we tend to fall into two camps: Are you a Marvel, or are you a DC? Fans spend hours arguing back and forth over who has the better universe/characters, and it is safe to say there will never be a consensus on the matter. Except in one arena; in the world of animation, DC wipes the floor with Marvel comics. And the reason can all be traced back to one man: Bruce Timm. After re-defining the DC Universe with his landmark television series in the 1990’s and early 2000’s (Batman, Superman, Batman Beyond and the Justice League) in 2006 Warner Brothers asked Timm to spearhead a new Direct to DVD series of PG-13 films featuring the DC Universe characters. And while the first release, Superman: Doomsday wasn’t stellar, the quality of each succeeding movie has just gotten better and better. And while the newest entry Green Lantern: Emerald Knights isn’t quite on par with the very best of the DC Animated movies (which, for the record, are Batman: Under the Red Hood, Wonder Woman and JLA: Crisis on 2 Earths, at least in this fan’s opinion) it is fair to say that Emerald Knights holds it’s own and is yet another a great addition to the DCU animated line-up.
This particular animated feature is obviously a promotional tie in with the upcoming live action Green Lantern movie, but the designs and look of the movie are not in continuity with the live action film at all. In fact, despite the character designs and models being exactly like the previous G.L. DTV movie First Flight, this movie is not in continuity with that movie either (Sinestro is seen as going bad much earlier than he does in Emerald Knights, among other things) This is also DC’s second DTV anthology movie, the first being one being 2008’s Batman: Gotham Knights. And I’ll say right off the bat this flick is a huge step up from that one. As part of their major Green Lantern presence at Wonder Con this past weekend, Warner Brothers premiered the whole movie to an audience of eager fans, and I bet very few were dissappointed.
One of the best things Emerald Knights has going for it, at least for this longtime DC comics fan, was the fact that the stories had a certain amount of actual suspense to them. As much as I enjoyed the previous animated flick Green Lantern: First Flight, I knew all the major story beats going into it; Abin Sur dying, giving the power ring to Hal Jordan-check. Sinestro, the greatest Green Lantern, goes bad-check. With Knights, I knew very little of the various story beats going in. I never knew the origin of the first Green Lantern for example, or the backstory of Kilowog, leading to an actual sense of surprise for me. That is rare in this kind of movie based on such well known and well covered material.
Despite being front and center on all the promotional materials for this movie, and the casting coup of getting fanboy favorite Nathan Fillion as the voice, the truth is Hal Jordan plays a very small part in the overall story, and mainly serves as narrator of the various Lantern stories to young GL Corps recruit Arisia (Elizabeth Moss from Mad Men.) The framing story involves the long ago banished rogue Guardian of the Universe named Krona returning to our universe in an effort to get revenge on his fellow Guardians and destroy their home planet of Oa. Emerging from Oa’s nearby sun with an army of shadow demons in tow (and also the size of Galactus for no reason…well, no other reason besides that it looked pretty damn cool) In an effort to stop Krona, every Lantern from every sector is called in to charge their rings at the main power battery, essentially forming the longest DMV line ever. While in line, Hal Jordan meets cute young recruit Arisia, and begins telling her various tales of the corps’ bravest and finest, probably just to impress her. In the comics, those two briefly dated, so seeing how they met was fun at least for this fan. But the meat n’ potatoes of this flick are the various stories of the Green Lantern Corps.
The first story deals with who the very first Green Lantern was, millions of years back, and how he discovered his power. This gets the anthology off to a great start, as we see how the Green Lantern Corps really came to be in pretty spectacular fashion. I won’t spoil just who the first true GL was, but when you get to see him unleash his full power on a group of evil aliens, it is some pretty cool shit. This first story is told “from the Book of Oa” so it is told almost like a Biblical fable, giving the whole thing an extra nice touch.
The second story involves the early days of fan favorite Green Lantern Kilowog (voiced by Henry Rollins) back when he was a young recruit, and his mean ol’ bastard of a drill sergeant, a small little creature named Deegan. Deegan is clearly meant to be the alien version of Full Metal Jacket’s marine corps instructor R.Lee Ermey, minus all the racial slurs. (well, unless the word “Poozer” has an unknown secret meaning) This entire sequence is the most charming, fun, and ultimately heartwarming, and features not a single character that looks remotely human. Although the action sequences in some of the other segments are better, the overall heart of this segment makes this one the clear winner for me.
The third story is probably my least favorite of the bunch, but it is by no means bad. It centers around Laira, a character faithful GL readers will remember made the transition from Green to Red Lantern, and finally to an undead Black Lantern. The whole story has an asian martial arts vibe, but aside from some cool action beats, this story doesn’t feel like it is offering me anything really new or compelling. Kelly Hu voices Laira and does a decent job, but the whole story just wasn’t that great to me, although I suspect a certain portion of the audience might find this one their favorite chapter, especially fans of characters like Elekta and Psylocke, or anime fans.
The fourth story is my choice for the second best part of this anthology; based on an old pre “I Hate DC Comics” Alan Moore story called “Mogo Doesn’t Socialize”, this story focues on the coolest G.L. of them all, Mogo the Living Planet. (not to be confused with Marvel’s Ego the Living Planet, who looks like a 70’s album cover) In this chapter, a warrior known as “Bulphunga the Unrelenting” (a name that is possibly topping my list for favorite comic book names right now) who is voiced by Rowdy Roddy Piper of all people, seeks to make his name by taking on the greatest Green Lantern of them all: Mogo. Not realizing that Mogo is a person as well a place, much wackiness ensues. This was the silliest chapter of the bunch, but was also a pure blast to watch.
The final flashback tale is one of Abin Sur, Hal Jordan’s predecessor as Lantern of Sector 2814. Not really great, but it shows the friendship of Abin Sur with “Greatest GL ever” Sinestro, as well as glimpses of the future Sinestro Corps as well as a pre-Red Lantern Atrocitus. This chapter was written by Geoff Johns, which explains why there are references to things like the Sinestro Corps and Atrocitus featured so prominently. There is a nice thematic element about destiny versus luck here, but it is never really fleshed out too much. But then, how much fleshing out can one really do in ten minutes? Jonhs is easily one of my favorite writers in comics ever, but this story feels slightly phoned it. Still and enjoyable part of the overall tapestry though.
The ending of the framing device story is cool, if predictable. (what, did you expect the bad guys to win or something?) Overall, the animation presented in this movie is superb, especially for a straight to DVD movie. The fight sequences have a fluidity in the animation that would have been just unheard of for a straight to video movie just five years ago, and while not quite on par with some of the very best animated DCU movies, this is leagues better than the last DC anthology flick Gotham Knights. I highly recommend this to any and all Green Lantern or DC Comics fans when this arrives on DVD and Blu Ray on June 7th.
(Editor’s Note: Watch the podcast in the next few weeks for interviews from Wondercon with the creative team behind Emerald Knights)
