By Cat Wyatt

Issue 35 left us off with four of the Green Lanterns rushing into danger in an attempt to rescue Ganthet and Sayd. We knew that time was short, as Sayd was due to be the next victim to the Controllers plans. Thankfully our heroic team arrived in time, but the fight was cut short by the end of the issue. Now we finally get to see what happens.

The authors likely knew that we were very anxious to see what was going to happen next, which is probably why they teased us by starting out with a whole page of black panels (literally black, with only text on them). To make matters worse it’s Ganthet pondering the concept of death, and the ultimate fate of the Guardians. Ganthet’s introspective monologue continues even with the arrival of the Green Lanterns; he turns his focus to each of them, giving us his true opinion (as well as a quick summary) of each.

And now onto the fight! If you recall in the last issue, Hal, Kyle, John, and Guy were all struggling against the weapons the Controllers’ mercenaries were using. So it shouldn’t be terribly surprising that the Controllers themselves would be using similar weapons. So really they rushed from one tough fight to the other. On the bright side, they definitely interrupted an evil monologue courtesy of the Controllers, so I’ll take it!

They Green Lanterns may be outnumbered and outmatched, but there’s one thing they have that the Controllers don’t. They have Guy and Kyle; Guy’s stubbornness and Kyle’s way of thinking outside of the box give John and Hal the opportunity for one strike and one strike only. Thankfully their aim was true, and the released the last of the Guardians to join the fight.

Now would probably be a good time to talk about the Guardians; after all the years they’ve survived, everything they’ve gone through, we’re now down to a mere six Guardians; Ganthet, Sayd, Kada Sal, Rami, Zalla, and Paalko. Meanwhile the Controllers have gone up by three (thanks to their nefarious plot). It’s a sad state of things, to be sure.

Now the Green Lanterns versus the Controllers was an uneven fight, as much as I hate to admit it (I do adore the team that’s come to the rescue), but the Green Lanterns and the Guardians versus the Controllers? Let’s just say I wouldn’t want to be on the Controllers side of the fight. Especially not after having so thoroughly ticking the Guardians off (can’t think of something that’d upset me more than watching my friends and family get ripped apart).

Despite there being such a low surviving number of Guardians, they still do not agree with how the Controllers should be handled (death or imprisonment) which unfortunately gave the villains the time they needed to escape. I have no doubt we’ll see them again however. In the meantime at least my favorite Guardians survived, and we got to see a pretty badass fight to boot.

I originally had thought this issue was going to be one that ended a plot, but instead they’re clearly setting up for something even bigger. Which shouldn’t surprise me; the Controllers are not throwaway villains, so it’s only nature that they’d be getting further built up with time. One battle does not win the war, after all. I’ll be curious to see where things go from here.

I loved the artwork for this issue, but I pretty much say that all the time for the Green Lantern series. To be fair, I am a big fan of bright colors, which is something the lantern series pretty much has to make liberal use of. They also excel at their dramatic poses, which is a huge plus if you ask me.

Score: 4/5

Hal Jordan and the Green Lantern Corps #36
Publisher: DC Comics