Green Lantern #76 (April 1970)
"No Evil Shall Escape My Sight"
Denny O'Neil-Neal Adams/Frank Giacoia
Doug: Long time comin' on this one, kiddies! Karen and I, along with our former colleague Sharon, had discussed taking a look at the Denny O'Neil/Neal Adams Green Lantern/Green Arrow series way back on the Two Girls, a Guy, and Some Comics blog.
Here on the BAB, Karen and I identified this as one that we knew we had to get to. So, without further ado, we begin a multi-issue inspection at this iconic series.
Karen: Part of the problem was, I had trouble locating the TPB collections of these stories. They seem to sell out quickly. But I now have volumes one and two in hand. On with the show!
Doug: Boy, if this one doesn't start out like a Silver Age DC. Green Lantern flying through the city, spots some toughs roughing up a middle-aged businessman, and intervenes. Typical Justice League Boy Scout, right?
Until Green Arrow shows up and says that if GL doesn't knock it off, he'll have to go through Ollie. Say what? Wow -- and this isn't a Marvel Comic?
Karen: You know, it may be 40 years old, but Neal Adams' artwork still looks phenomenal to my eyes! That man could draw a story about the Care Bears and I'd look at it!
Doug: On the very next page, we the reader are almost-literally slapped in the face with Denny O'Neil's new "social relevance". Green Arrow takes Green Lantern into the apartment building where the skirmish had taken place and introduces him to a grandmother... the young man who had roughed up the suit (Slade) actually did it to the guy because he owns the building and was about to evict all of the tenants in the name of building a parking lot that would make him more money. I have to protest at the last few lines of dialogue on the page, however -- when GL states that Ollie should get off his back, that he was only doing his job,
GA rebukes him with a comparison to the pleas of Nazi war criminals at the Nuremberg trials. That was a little over the top in my opinion.
Karen: Well, pretty much all of GA's dialogue is over the top - and I'm guessing that back then, we hadn't heard that Nazi comparison made as frequently as we would in later decades. But in any case, O'Neil makes darn sure we know exactly where the two heroes stand!
Doug: GL seems pretty easily convinced that he needs to pursue social justice. There's an oft-reprinted scene where a grizzled old black man approaches Hal and asks him what exactly he's done for the black man? That spurs GL to fly to the penthouse apartment of the land-(slum)lord and plead with him to not bulldoze the apartment complex. Of course the fat cat scoffs at the notion and asks his bodyguards to show GL the door. Hal uses his fists to end the potential escort,
but is stopped in the middle of his own assault on the landlord by one of the Guardians -- and is immediately summoned to Oa where he is chastised for his actions. Hal apologizes, and declares that it won't be a problem again.
Karen: It's pretty clear from the writing that O'Neil thinks GL is a pawn of the Guardians, the Establishment, and an all-around square! That's probably the biggest problem with these stories -the view is decidedly lop-sided towards Arrow's liberal philosophy. It doesn't seem like there's a real effort to show a balance between the two -
Lantern is just a law and order stooge who doesn't see the real picture.
Doug: You're right about the "square" part -- and one could have said this about any of DC's main heroes during the Silver Age.
"No Evil Shall Escape My Sight"
Denny O'Neil-Neal Adams/Frank Giacoia
Doug: Long time comin' on this one, kiddies! Karen and I, along with our former colleague Sharon, had discussed taking a look at the Denny O'Neil/Neal Adams Green Lantern/Green Arrow series way back on the Two Girls, a Guy, and Some Comics blog.
Here on the BAB, Karen and I identified this as one that we knew we had to get to. So, without further ado, we begin a multi-issue inspection at this iconic series.Karen: Part of the problem was, I had trouble locating the TPB collections of these stories. They seem to sell out quickly. But I now have volumes one and two in hand. On with the show!
Doug: Boy, if this one doesn't start out like a Silver Age DC. Green Lantern flying through the city, spots some toughs roughing up a middle-aged businessman, and intervenes. Typical Justice League Boy Scout, right?
Until Green Arrow shows up and says that if GL doesn't knock it off, he'll have to go through Ollie. Say what? Wow -- and this isn't a Marvel Comic?Karen: You know, it may be 40 years old, but Neal Adams' artwork still looks phenomenal to my eyes! That man could draw a story about the Care Bears and I'd look at it!
Doug: On the very next page, we the reader are almost-literally slapped in the face with Denny O'Neil's new "social relevance". Green Arrow takes Green Lantern into the apartment building where the skirmish had taken place and introduces him to a grandmother... the young man who had roughed up the suit (Slade) actually did it to the guy because he owns the building and was about to evict all of the tenants in the name of building a parking lot that would make him more money. I have to protest at the last few lines of dialogue on the page, however -- when GL states that Ollie should get off his back, that he was only doing his job,
GA rebukes him with a comparison to the pleas of Nazi war criminals at the Nuremberg trials. That was a little over the top in my opinion.Karen: Well, pretty much all of GA's dialogue is over the top - and I'm guessing that back then, we hadn't heard that Nazi comparison made as frequently as we would in later decades. But in any case, O'Neil makes darn sure we know exactly where the two heroes stand!
Doug: GL seems pretty easily convinced that he needs to pursue social justice. There's an oft-reprinted scene where a grizzled old black man approaches Hal and asks him what exactly he's done for the black man? That spurs GL to fly to the penthouse apartment of the land-(slum)lord and plead with him to not bulldoze the apartment complex. Of course the fat cat scoffs at the notion and asks his bodyguards to show GL the door. Hal uses his fists to end the potential escort,
but is stopped in the middle of his own assault on the landlord by one of the Guardians -- and is immediately summoned to Oa where he is chastised for his actions. Hal apologizes, and declares that it won't be a problem again.Karen: It's pretty clear from the writing that O'Neil thinks GL is a pawn of the Guardians, the Establishment, and an all-around square! That's probably the biggest problem with these stories -the view is decidedly lop-sided towards Arrow's liberal philosophy. It doesn't seem like there's a real effort to show a balance between the two -
Lantern is just a law and order stooge who doesn't see the real picture.Doug: You're right about the "square" part -- and one could have said this about any of DC's main heroes during the Silver Age.
Doug: After GL is sent on a "time-out" by the Guardians, we cut back to Earth to see Ollie also attempting to get Slade to ease up on the poor folks. Slade smarts off to him, so GA pins him to the wall with four arrows. GA threatens Slade -- tries to extort $25K out of him for "protection money". They make a deal to drop the cash at an abandoned warehouse. Of course Slade sends his thugs to off GA; GA has it set up with a dummy and a tape recorder, but the box is shot up in the fracas. So, instead of a taped confession that would put Slade in jail, Ollie ends up with only a couple of heavies to turn in to the cops.
Doug: Cut back to Slade's offices. After a little plotting, GA and GL come up with a plan to dupe Slade into a confession. Accompanied by the district attorney, Hal disguises himself as one of Slade's thugs.
All they have to do is get Slade to mention the hit on GA, which he promptly obliges. It's almost too easy. This scene has a great visual of Slade caught in a power ring rat trap. A box at the bottom of the page promises a not-so-happy epilogue, however...
Doug: But in reality, it's not so bad. GA climbs back up on his soapbox... He rips the Guardians, rips Hal, invokes the names of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy, and unbelievably (to me, at least) convinces one of the Guardians to journey to Earth and walk as a man, to experience the social injustice that is America in the Vietnam era. This should be interesting...
Karen: You know, God help me, I actually liked Arrow's little speech. Maybe it's because I grew up with the moralizing on TV shows like Star Trek,
but I thought it was very affecting when GA said, "Something is wrong! Something is killing us all! Some hideous moral cancer is rotting our very souls!" I mean, that statement is just as relevant today as it was 40 years ago. Maybe the level of social upheaval is not the same, but it sure feels like things are very wrong right now. Well, to me at least.
Doug: Neal Adams' art is stellar as usual. In its own way it's familiar and comfortable; not in the same way that Sal Buscema's is, but a warm greeting all its own. Denny O'Neil's words, on the other hand, are very good when he's trying to just tell the story. In the scenes where he preaches the script is quite over the top. I think, because this is such a departure from anything that had come before it comes off really forced. Had we been able to ease into this, to have some sort of awakening over time rather than a snap to alertness, Oliver Queen might have come off better. But then again, maybe that was the point.
Karen: Not having been a DC reader at the time, I don't have a solid comparison. From the few DC books I've read from the 60s, this does seem like a big departure from the rather bland, cookie-cutter personalities the heroes seemed to have. It feels much more like a Marvel comic!
Doug: Cut back to Slade's offices. After a little plotting, GA and GL come up with a plan to dupe Slade into a confession. Accompanied by the district attorney, Hal disguises himself as one of Slade's thugs.
All they have to do is get Slade to mention the hit on GA, which he promptly obliges. It's almost too easy. This scene has a great visual of Slade caught in a power ring rat trap. A box at the bottom of the page promises a not-so-happy epilogue, however...Doug: But in reality, it's not so bad. GA climbs back up on his soapbox... He rips the Guardians, rips Hal, invokes the names of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy, and unbelievably (to me, at least) convinces one of the Guardians to journey to Earth and walk as a man, to experience the social injustice that is America in the Vietnam era. This should be interesting...
Karen: You know, God help me, I actually liked Arrow's little speech. Maybe it's because I grew up with the moralizing on TV shows like Star Trek,
but I thought it was very affecting when GA said, "Something is wrong! Something is killing us all! Some hideous moral cancer is rotting our very souls!" I mean, that statement is just as relevant today as it was 40 years ago. Maybe the level of social upheaval is not the same, but it sure feels like things are very wrong right now. Well, to me at least.Doug: Neal Adams' art is stellar as usual. In its own way it's familiar and comfortable; not in the same way that Sal Buscema's is, but a warm greeting all its own. Denny O'Neil's words, on the other hand, are very good when he's trying to just tell the story. In the scenes where he preaches the script is quite over the top. I think, because this is such a departure from anything that had come before it comes off really forced. Had we been able to ease into this, to have some sort of awakening over time rather than a snap to alertness, Oliver Queen might have come off better. But then again, maybe that was the point.
Karen: Not having been a DC reader at the time, I don't have a solid comparison. From the few DC books I've read from the 60s, this does seem like a big departure from the rather bland, cookie-cutter personalities the heroes seemed to have. It feels much more like a Marvel comic!
16 comments:
Yeah, it's a bit rudimentary, but only when watched through modern eyes; but for that time, it was revolutionary, and I applaud it.
On an obvious note, as horrible as what the landlord was doing was; roughing him up WAS ilegal and GL was right to stop the guy doing it. Obvious, I know.
"There's an oft-reprinted scene where a grizzled old black man approaches Hal and asks him what exactly he's done for the black man?"
I believe there was an LOC a few issues later from regular scribe Guy Lillian III, who suggested that Lantern's reply should have been "I've only saved this entire planet a couple of dozen times, so flake off!"
Somehow it might have cut the next ten or so issues short...
cheers
B Smith
BSmith -
You're exactly right about cutting the series short, and to be honest that might have been more palatable. You'll see, as we go through the next 2-3 issues, that this out-of-left-field/about-face in writing style and content just puts me off. I am a proponent of social justice, but O'Neil's writing style was so over the top in this particular series that it's quite overwhelming to read even now.
I think back to some of the State of the Union addresses given by Bill Clinton -- you couldn't be a minority in this country and not feel like he was in your corner... Denny O'Neil could have written those speeches, I think.
Thanks for the comment (and you, too, MaGnUs)!
Doug
I don't think it's that over the top; considering two things: a) the time it was written in, and b) the medium it was written in.
If it was something other than a comic, I agree that for the time it's a bit too pamphletary... but for a comic book, and particularly a mainstream superhero comic book... it's revolutionary to think that someone would deal with such matters in such an overt way.
MaGnUs --
Your points are well-taken.
Do you think (or anyone else reading this) that O'Neil and Adams get too much credit for this sort of thing? Stan Lee and Roy Thomas had been doing it for years at Marvel (two memorable Sons of the Serpent stories in the Avengers come to mind, as well as Roy's apartheid story in FF #119 -- it would be cover dated Feb. 1972, after these books).
Your use of the term "overt" is spot on.
Doug
Yeah, I think O'Neil and Adams have gotten enough credit for this; they are recognized as groundbreaking, much in the same way Stan Lee has been praised by the social commentary in early X-Men stories... however, we must remember that DC heroes are, generally speaking, much more iconic than their Marvel counterparts... this is not Superman or Batman, granted, but it's Green Lantern, a guy who (in a manner of speech, since this is Hal and not Alan) has been around since the 40s, and Green Arrow has been around that long basically as the same character.
I've seen several articles and mentions about this socially groundbreaking run by O'Neil and Adams in GL/GA, and as Green Lantern fan, I'm happy enough with the credit they get.
As for my use of the term "overt", it's just that while some might accuse them of "blunt", or even "simplistic", considerations must be made for the medium and time. In an underground comic of the time, or a TV show, I would have considered it blunt or simplistic... in a superhero comic published by DC Comics with two of its most important characters... overt, and groundbreaking.
Yep -- that this was a DC is perhaps the most significant point. In Marvels even of the time, social commentary was expected. This sort of broke the "Boy Scout" mode of DC's heroes -- albeit as you point out, their second-tier characters.
No, not second-tier. Green Lantern is part of the "Big Seven" in DC, and Green Arrow is close enough, both classic members of their premier super team, the JLA, and members of the Super Friends, arguably, the most recognizable superhero cartoon outside comics fandom,
They might not be part of the Trinity (Superman/Wonder Woman/Batman), but they're definitely not second-tier.
We'll part ways, then, on DC's A- and B-level designations. I think the lens used needs to be that of the general public. The "trinity", as you said, is easily recognizable to the average man-on-the-street; you have to add Robin to that mix.
Flash would probably be next, in large part due to anyone who recalls the early-1990's television show. After that, although certainly important in DC history and the current DC Universe, would fall GL, GA, Aquaman, Hawkman, the Atom, and the Martian Manhunter. I'd argue that Aquaman, due in large part to his role in Super Friends, would be the only "household name" of that group.
So, I don't mean to disparage those characters with the use of the term -- they're great characters with quite a longevity in the industry, no doubt. I was just using the term in regard to general pop culture in the USA.
And over at Marvel, past Spidey and the Hulk, you'd only recently speak of the X-Men as being popularly known. And Iron Man? Wow -- talk about upping his pop culture face time! Although a foundation of the Marvel Universe, he was Grade-B for decades.
...in my opinion.
Doug
I understand what you're saying, but I think there's three levels of "public":
1) The comic book fan, which will recognize most characters, regardless of how familiar he is with their particular histories (I'm no expert in Hawkman or Atom, for example).
2) The general public, which will recognize characters who've had movies or other mainstream presence, like Superman, Spider-Man, Batman, Hulk, Wonder woman.
3) And then there's the general public of a certain age... most people who were young when the Super Friends was airing, and now with the JLA/JLU animated series, will recognize Green Arrow, Green Lantern, Aquaman, etc.
But yeah, I know what you're saying.
Well said -- it's tough to say "general public", because you nailed it. There's really even tiers in comic knowledge, particularly these days with all of the mass media attention to our lovable hobby!!
Doug
Defining 'tiers' of characters is definitely tricky. I would say most of my non-comics reading peers would only be able to name the Super Friends from DC,which would put Aquaman in the top tier! After all, he not only appeared on Super Friends but had his own cartoon show. So no matter how lame most comics fans consider him to be, he's probably more recognizable to the average Joe than Green Lantern or Green Arrow.
Oh yes, Aquaman is more recognizable to the general public at large than the Green Objects. And of course, I'm sure we all agree that there's "real world popularity tiers" and "in-universe A/B/C/etc/ lists"; as in, Iron Man was always an A-lister in the Marvel Universe, but was mostly unknown to non-comic readers until his recent mainstream popularity.
"I don't think it's that over the top; considering two things: a) the time it was written in, and b) the medium it was written in."
I think this probably can't be emphasised enough...while it's true that Stan and Roy had pushed the envelope in social relevance, this time it seemed as if Denny had decided that if he was going to do it, he may as well go for broke - although from various interviews etc read since, Neal may have pushed things along somewhat, playing Arrow to Denny's Lantern.
In this here land down under, DC superhero comics were rare beasts (you wanted House of Mystery or Our Love? No problem. You want Batman or Superman? Forget it)...they were largely only available in black and white reprints, so with one thing or another, I never saw any of these till the mid 70s (and in fact some I didn't see till those mid 80s collected reprints). Even then, despite the Spider-Man drug issues etc, they were like a splash of cold water in the face, brimming with pent-up energy and anger...for many years they were considered a high-water mark in "what comics can do" and it's been a bit disappointing to this little black dinosaur to see some kind of re-evaluating consensus declare them as being too shrill...it's like saying that The Beatles' hair really was too long, or The Who really were too loud. To my mind, they were an important milestone in mainstream comics, (regardless of where GA and GL are in the DC pantheon), and it's to everybody's shame that the issues highlighted in many issues are still with us, if not worse.
cheers
B Smith
B. Smith: Some things are worse, yes, but we have made a lot of progress... It's an odd thing, humanity, when we can progress so much in some aspects, and yet remain the same in others...
Good points regarding these comics. Whenever we review books, I do try to put them in the context of their times. But that's not always easy 30+ years later. While I can see that what O'Neil and Adams were doing was new and different back then, it's still difficult at times to get past the proselytizing. But there's no denying the impact of these stories -which is why we're reading them!
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