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| Green Lantern
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Hal Jordan and The Original; Alan Scott
Behind them the Guardians look on.
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| Gender
| Male
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| Publisher
| DC Comics
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| Origin
| (Hal Jordan) Coast City
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| First Appearance
| (Alan Scott) All-American Comics #16 (July, 1940) (Hal Jordan) Showcase #22 (September-October, 1959)
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| Creator(s)
| (Alan Scott) Bill Finger, Martin Nodell, (Hal Jordan) John Broome, Gil Kane, Joe Giella
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| Alter ego
| Alan Scott, Hal Jordan, Guy Gardner, John Stewart, Kyle Rayner
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| Aliases
| (Kyle Rayner) Ion, Torch Bearer; (Hal Jordan) The Emerald Guardian, The Ring Bearer (Guy Gardner) Warrior, Honor Guard; (Alan Scott) Sentinel
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| Abilities
| Power Ring, allows wearer to do anything he can "will" it to do.
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| Affiliations
| (Hal Jordan) Green Lantern Corps, Justice League (Alan Scott) Justice Society of America
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Green Lantern is a DC Comics fictional comic book super-hero.
There have been several different "Green Lanterns" from Earth over the years.
Golden Age Green Lantern
The first incarnation was radio engineer Alan Scott, who was the Green Lantern during the Golden Age of Comics. Alan Scott found that, because he was holding a mysterious green lantern, he was the only survivor of a horrible accident involving a train and an exploding bridge. This lantern and ring were powered by the mysterious "Green Flame", whose origins were linked to a space meteor that fell to earth in ancient China.
The writers spoke of Alan's power as if it were magic based, calling it "supernatural" and that it would do anything he could "will it" to do. This magical ring could protect Alan against metal weapons, but was somehow ineffective against wood, its one vulnerability. For Alan Scott, the ring and lantern had a more magical Aladdin's Lamp kind of quality than it did for later Green Lanterns.
This original Green Lantern was a featured "mystery man" during the 1940s, and fought Nazis and other villains in his own adventures and as part of the Justice Society of America.
Alan Scott also started the tradition of the Green Lantern reciting an oath while charging his ring. Hal Jordan kept up this tradition, though he hasn't used it much of late. For details on the Green Lantern Oaths, click the link to the Oaths article.
Silver Age Green Lantern
Test Pilot Hal Jordan is surprised when his flight simulator takes flight, and is carried by an eerie green light to the desert site of dying alien Abin Sur. Abin Sur explains that he is a Green Lantern, possessor of a very special ring.
Hal Jordan in the center, with two other members of the Green Lantern Corps on each side of him.
Whoever wears this amazing ring will discover that its green light energy will do anything its wearer can imagine, including granting the power of flight, just by the force of the owner's will-power. The only exception is that, due to a "necessary impurity in the ring", it can't affect anything yellow, its one vulnerability.
The lay dying, the ring searches for a suitable replacement candidate, supposedly a man who is honest and "born without fear" who would use the power "against the forces of evil and injustice". The ring selected Hal.
When Hal was young, he lived at Edwards Airforce Base with his parents, his father being an Air force Pilot. In those days, Hal's greatest fear was losing his dad, which came to pass in a tragic plane crash. His greatest fear realized, Hal found that he wasn't scared by anything. It was as though his greatest fear could never be replaced. His fearless nature led to him joining the airforce himself, and his later taking on the dangerous position of a test pilot for Ferris Aircraft. Now it has lead to him being selected by the ring to be a Green Lantern.
Hal now accepts the ring and its lantern shaped "power battery", which recharges the ring's power every 24 hours. In later stories we learn that Hal is actually part of a large Green Lantern Corps, a kind of galactic police force. Each Corps member is assigned to a different space sector by these little ancient blue aliens called The Guardians of the Universe. The "Guardians" live on the planet Oa, located in the exact center of the universe. The Guardians all look exactly alike to our eyes, and are a force for order in a chaotic universe.
Earth happens to be in Sector 2814, as the Guardians count these things. Keeping order in this became Hal Jordan's assignment.
The Hal Jordan version was created in the 1959 as part of an attempt during the Silver Age of Comics to revive and modernize these older Golden Age heroes, in this case with a more science fiction feel to it.
In his early days, Hal Jordan was well-meaning but a bit politically naive. He soon became close friends with fellow Justice League member, the more savy, (if a bit liberal) Green Arrow. Teamed together, the two went on an odyssey to "discover America", in a series of comics that marked the beginning of The Bronze Age of Comics.
Other Green Lanterns
Other Earth men have worn the ring over the years, either temporarily replacing Hal Jordan or becoming a concurrent member of the Green Lantern Corps in their own right. The first new ring-bearer after Hal was the arrogant Guy Gardner, then came the the proud African-American architect John Stewart (depicted in the Justice League animated series), and finally professional illustrator Kyle Rayner, who is now known as the being Ion. All of these Green Lantern Corps members have also been members of the Justice League. These days, Hal Jordan is back as the star of the Green Lantern comic book, while the other Lanterns have supporting character roles and alternate the lead role in the Green Lanters Corps own comic book.
Guy Gardner
Guy Gardner's first appearance was in Green Lantern #59 (March, 1968). When Abin Sur's power ring was looking for a candidate for Green Lantern, he found both Hal and Guy, but chose Hal merely because he was closer. He was a linebacker at the University of Michigan while studying law at the time, and had no idea how close he came to greatness. Years later, he was called on to substitute for Hal when he was temporarily incapacitated, and discovered his destiny to be a hero. years later, the Guardians gave him his own ring in preparation for the crossover event Crisis on Infinite Earths (1985). Guy is a bit arrogant and rough around the edges, but tells himself that he doesn't care much what others think of him. The Guardians at least think well of him, because they assigned him to their home planet Oa and gave him the special title of Honor Guard Green Lantern.
Guy's ring is always crackling with power, like his willpower is struggling to escape and be used. He usually uses it as a blunt object, hitting his foe where it will hurt the most.
John Stewart
John Stewart made his first appearance in Green Lantern #87 (December, 1971), a product of the Bronze Age of Comics. As such, he wanted to make the role of Green Lantern more "relevant" (a watchword in the early Bronze Age) to the ordinary Earthling, and claimed he was more interested in helping the man in the street rather than aliens on a distant planet. When Guy Gardner is injured and goes into a coma, John is chosen and trained as his replacement as Hal's possible substitute. Eventually, he earns the status as full member in the Green Lantern Corps. John's use of the ring has its own style. An architect, he tends to look deeply into the structure of things, and his complex light structures reflect this.
Kyle Rayner
Kyle Rayner first appeared in Green Lantern # 48
(January, 1994). Kyle received his ring largely by chance. After the Parallax fiasco, the Green Lantern Corps closed down for a while. Ganthet, one of the last remaining Guardians, brought the last power ring to Earth, where he found Kyle in an alley behind a bar and offered him the ring. Kyle is sometimes referred to as "Torch Bearer", as he was, for a while, the sole Green Lantern left in the universe. With no one to guide him, Kyle learned to use the ring on his own. In an early battle, his girlfriend was brutally murdered one of his early enemies, Major Force. He was a principal player in the bringing back of the Guardians and the Green Lantern Corps, and helped Hal free himself of the Parallax infection.
A professional illustrator, Kyle was always had a distinctive use of the green energy. His constructs were those of an artist, in themselves temporary works of art and of imaginative design.
Related Terms and Articles
External Links
To see specific information, such as more on individual Green Lanterns or other characters, please click the Green Lantern category link at the bottom of this article. To see other articles that reference the Green Lantern, such as the Oaths article, please click the What Links Here tool in the toolbox at the bottom of this page.
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