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‘Green Lantern: Blackstars #1’ (review)

Written by Grant Morrison
Art by Xermanico
Published by DC Comics

 

“Observe! The planet Oa. It’s resplendent, violated corpse.”

 

We are officially through the Looking Glass folks.

And that’s exactly where Grant Morrison has taken Hal Jordan and the Green Lanterns this month as well, along with all of observable Creation itself, as we see the utterly transformative results of Controller Mu’s astonishing, inexorable Wishing Machine.

A Wishing Machine that has imposed one inescapable truth that now rules the Omniverse: Mu’s Will, unbroken and entire.

Mu will have peace. Peace by his hand. Nothing shall escape his design. No aspect of reality shall be in resistance. No single soul opposed.

It is a singular achievement, one of ruthless implementation. Mu’s Will will be done. All will fall in line with his plan. However much perversion must be utilized to ensure total compliance with his resolve. However much, once thought inalienable, that must be relinquished in service to his cause. No measure is too great. No means too profane.

It’s a grand and perfect dream. All whirling about the single, fixed point of Mu’s unassailable certainty. A certainty in his own perfect correctness. A certainty in his right to triumph. Only Mu will determine what is right. Only he will determine… all.

Sound impossible? Sound extreme? And yet that is exactly as we find it, here in the first pages of Grant Morrison’s latest exploration of the truly monstrous. A world where peace is only found in utter acquiescence to one man’s desire. One man’s determination. One man’s obscene, unyielding will.

And that man ain’t Hal Jordan.

Indeed, Hal Jordan no longer wears the mantle of Green Lantern. Now he is only Blackstar Parallax. And alongside him, in Blackstar uniforms of their very own, is every member of the once might Green Lantern Corp.

For all beings will become Blackstars in the service of Controller Mu and his Dream. All under the sacred direction of his favored protege, the Eater of Planets, the beautiful, terrifying Blackstar Belzebeth.

All beings, beginning with the most powerful. The universe’s mightiest super protectors. The front guard demons of Ysmault. (And that’s certainly a dread foreshadowing, of dark shadows yet to be explored.) Even the greatest of universal warlord tyrants. However much in opposition they are inclined to be, or once may have been, to each other, to Mu, to even the very idea of subjugation.

All will be remade. All realigned to the one great new will now underpinning reality… Or so it very much appears.

The execution of this splendid nightmare reality is superbly carried off by Grant Morrison, whose script wrestles the very stuff of polarity and contrast, and all the emanations of free will to choose between them, bending all towards a vision of terribly exacted unity.

Assisting with the pictures for this mirror glass three issue limited run, is the fantastic artistic team of Xermanico and colorist Steve Oliff, who gamely fashion all of Morrison’s wild imaginings, whether vile or sublime, ensuring all the while that the faces of our newest, grandest adversaries always sport a perfect shade of orange.

And what of our hero?

Well, as with everyone, there is nothing in Hal Jordan that seems out of step with Mu’s perfect plan. In fact, he is second only to Belzebeth in command, a fact certainly having to do with his own vital role in the operation of Mu’s great Wishing Machine.

But for all that appearances seem to be what they are, we – and Mu – know full well what Hal Jordan is capable of pulling off when his back is against the wall.

Which is why Hal Jordan will be tested.

With a sacrifice perhaps too impossible to bear…

 

Next Issue: A world in the balance. Actually, our world in the balance.

 

 

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