Rating:  -
It starts out very well by going into the action and it is well written until you get to the center of the novel. At that time I felt that I needed a college degree to get thru the rest of it. The book goes into a metaphysical, scientifical, and all other ifical reasons and explanations for the origin of heroes.
Not what I thought when I saw it. i read one other Justice League novel and it was almost the same way. This has turned me off to this type of novel.
Use your money to go and get a comic book, it is better in my opinion.
Welty69
Rating:  -
I knew coming into this book that the origin of Kyle Rayner was not going to be the exact same one that we saw in the comic books. I normally don't like it when characters origins are messed with, but I decided to give this book a try anyways. I actually really enjoyed this book and thought that it was one of the best stories out of the JLA series thus far. The story flowed very well and it held my interest so that I couldn't barely put it down. Sure it wasn't the perfect representation of the Green Lantern Corps but it was a great read. I do recommend this book.
Rating: -
This was a really cool book! Im a huge comic book fan and I have almost everyone made. I still lack a few however and they are pretty hard to find. The best books that i have read have been the JLA series. I highly recommend them to any comic book fan. This book has a little bit of all the green lanterns. Hal Jordan is the Spectre, Kyle Rayner is the main character, Alan Scott, the original green lantern is Kyle's girlfriend's father. I am not going to tell you the plot other than it involves Sinestro. It is a very good book. Can't wait for the next one. By the way the other JLA books are Batman: Stone King, Superman: Neverending Battle, Wonder Woman: Mythos, JLA: Exterminators, Flash: Stop Motion . All are very very good!!
Rating:  -
2.5 stars
To me, Hal Jordan will always be Green Lantern. However I found the beginning of this work fairly strong. Kyle is endearing as a slacker and a loser who ends up with the ring. He's presented pretty well in having difficulties dealing with the ring and the rest of the JLA. It is a bit off-putting though to return to the alleged origin and see his best friend the Flash sneering at him for being irresponsible.
After we get rid of the rest of the JLA by magic, which is the one major suspension of disbelief the reader must get over in every one of these solo JLA novels, Kyle must rise to the occasion.
He does of course, but the story veers crazily at this point into a melange of hard-sf physics, meta-physics and existentialism. Rather than doing much of anything, Kyle engages in lengthy socratic dialogues with his Oan mentor and philosophizes on reality, immortality, the rights and responsibilities of power and on change. Now many of these things should be included in a superhero novel to elevate it above mere action but here it is overdone and done poorly.
The ending is also inadequate and very unbelievable. Other nonsense includes the idea that Oans created superheroes 10 years ago. Ok, sure, there are many different realities in the DC metaverse, but this is a series and the series must remain consistent. In this case we already have 3 generations of Flashes so this 10 years is nonsense.
Even as a standalone book, taken apart from the rest of the series the liberties taken with "known history" would be jarring and less than acceptable.
What I always loved about Green Lantern was the power of the ring that needed to be used with such creativity. Sadly we get little of that here as O'Neil one of the premier GL writers turns it into a hard-sf universe building novel mixed in with meta-physics, and existential philosophy.
To sum it up, the origin story and the hilarious satire of the action-adventure genre at the start was good. The last half was badly wanting.
Rating: -
I particularly enjoyed the first half of this book. Even though it was almost a "novelization" of Kyle Rayner's GL origins, it was still cool to join Kyle in his discovery of the power ring's abilities, and all of the potential therein. Telling the story in first person POV helped the reader share the experience.
BUT ... once the main part of the story got going, sadly, I lost a little interest. It sort of became "just another super hero novel," just interesting enough to finish, but not standing out in any particular way. I also bought "Superman: The Never-Ending Battle" at the same time. We'll see how they compare.
One other point of confusion: It has been a while since I have read the "Green Lantern" comic books, but I always understood that the power rings required a great deal of "Willpower" to operate. I understand that Kyle Rayner is supposed to HAVE this willpower, and so qualifies to possess it, but I still thought that making the ring create, like, a giant hand would have taken a little ... oomph! on the part of the ring wearer. It was confusing, and another letdown, that the ring seemed so EASY for Kyle to operate. Maybe DC has changed this rule over the years, and if so, it caught me off guard. Sorry, but this change/inconsistency alone prompts me to knock it down another Star rating.
But, overall, it was an enjoyable read, and I don't regret buying it. Flawed, but worth the time.
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