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Review: Green Lantern 201

Posted by CmdrTaco from the green-lanterns-light dept.
In summers past we've seen big guns like Superman and Spider-man and Batman make big screen appearances, but this summer it's lesser known heroes like Thor and Green Lantern taking to the big screen with varying degrees of success. What follows is my brief review of the new GL film with some spoilers and commentary. You have been warned.

The plot is simple: Alien gives magical ring to brave test pilot which makes him a member of the space police, and unsurprisingly a big monster is coming to destroy the earth.

I feel like they cast Reynolds wanting him to play Kyle, but the executives had decided that they were going to cast Hal because they all remembered Superfriends. Reynolds is a charming actor with a gross streak, but the movie barely lets him run loose. Peter Sarsgaard is pretty awesome, but the whole daddy-issues thing is so belabored by the end of the movie that you just don't care. Everyone else is completely forgettable (Sinestro), underutilized (Kilowog), or just flat-out boring (Carol).

The special effects are ok. Not great, but not bad either. It doesn't help matters that the whole green lantern ring power is pretty silly. Using the power of will to create giant punching gloves and green gatling guns and springs is pretty cheesy stuff. Of course, that's the bread and butter of Green Lantern: using creative, imaginative solutions to fight monsters. Fun visual gags. The movie shies away from all that, instead just letting GL do flips and float around in a green ball except for occasional moments.

What it all comes down to for me is that the movie failed to embrace the raw 'Fun' in the same way that, lets say, Thor did. Let's face it: both super heroes have a lot of silly in them. OA and Asgard are over-the-top locations. Fighting with a magic ring that can create giant fists to punch people, or using a giant hammer, are sillier weapons than a utility belt or super strength.

The difference is that Thor made fun of it, goofing on the hammer, creating a charming supporting cast of superheroes and humans that made it clear you were supposed to smile and have some fun. But GL spends huge blocks of the movie trying to make you feel like OA is Awesome and that the Lantern Corps are a big deal. Unfortunately, it just doesn't succeed; it comes off as unintentionally cheesy. It spends so much time trying to convince you it's the epic start of a massive franchise that it forgets to have the fun that you want. For example: the joy when Peter Parker first figures out how to web-sling; the thrill of a Mutant displaying newly discovered powers; or just the joy of human flight. Reynolds could have done great stuff here, but it's limited to just a few moments sandwiched between so much grandiose plotting. Ugh.

X-Men: First Class is probably the best comic book movie so far this summer. But Thor is just more straight up "fun." Green Lantern just tries so hard that it feels boring; you'd be better off seeing Super 8, which at least has fun. But there's still Captain America around the corner, and it has had the strongest trailer so far. Here's hoping!
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Review: Green Lantern More

Review: Green Lantern

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  • There's more sacrifice in real life than there are in modern movies. Really, it's an overused tactic from long ago but it has long since bored me when the main character makes a perceived sacrifice and the writers put everything back to normal. For long running series, this is necessary to keep the same characters rolling but a lot of what I see today just makes me feel patronized. Are they targeting a younger age group or afraid that I can't handle loss? And I'm not talking about "Oh boohoo, I have superpowers now and will never know what it's like to be a normal human." I'm talking about real permanent irrevocable loss from a tough decision. Whether it's fun or not gets overlooked in my mind when this act of personal sacrifice for the good is later trivialized.

    <Thor Spoiler Alert> That's what bothered me about Thor ... "oh the king is sick, nope instantly better." "Oh, I'll never see Amidala again! Just kidding, there's always a way to restore the waygates." "Oh no, he lost his brother Loki! Wait now Loki's talking to Nick Fury in the post-credits scene." What the hell, Hollywood? I understand that people go to movies to escape reality but what does it even mean when Thor sacrifices any connection to his woman to save an enemy race from genocide and then scenes later it turns out you're just going to make a sequel to undo that? </Thor Spoiler Alert>

    What draws me to Sunshine, The Watchmen and Game of Thrones more so than The Green Lantern or Harry Potter? Your friends don't step in and save you at the end and there aren't any phoenix tears to make everything instantly better. Lazy plot devices and disney endings are a dime a dozen--am I the only person that feels this way? I guess profit margin says "yes." Go ahead and check your boxes for love plot, slapstick comedy, action and a happy ending. People have to get sick of your formulas at some point.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by marnues ( 906739 )
      Pretty much sums up why I gave up on Marvel and DC at the age of 11.

    • Re:Impermanence of Sacrifice Bores Me (Score:5, Interesting)

      by bennomatic ( 691188 ) on Monday June 20, 2011 @12:23PM (#36502656) Homepage
      You are absolutely not alone. One of the things that stuck out for me about I am Legend was the hero's ongoing sacrifices. He lost his family. He lost his dog, the last vestiges of his humanity, and finally his life. The story goes on after the movie, but there's no hint of a Legend 2: Zombie Will Smith Fights Back.

      Even Black Swan was great in that way. NP gives her all--she gives her very life--to be the perfect white+black swan.

      I hate it when movies don't commit.

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by ackthpt ( 218170 )

        You are absolutely not alone. One of the things that stuck out for me about I am Legend was the hero's ongoing sacrifices. He lost his family. He lost his dog, the last vestiges of his humanity, and finally his life. The story goes on after the movie, but there's no hint of a Legend 2: Zombie Will Smith Fights Back.

        Even Black Swan was great in that way. NP gives her all--she gives her very life--to be the perfect white+black swan.

        I hate it when movies don't commit.

        Sounds like you, too, are ready to move on to Indy Cinema - those films where you have good cast, good direction and a story which could end in any way possible. Much more impressive than anything at the corporate cinemas these days, where you see the trailer, you see the film.

        Here's a thought for a Super Hero film .. someone suddenly is born with super powers/finds a rune which grants powers/is bitten by a radioactive leech/what have you, they're SUPER now, in some capacity. They are the only one like t

        • Sounds like you, too, are ready to move on to Indy Cinema - those films where you have good cast, good direction and a story which could end in any way possible. Much more impressive than anything at the corporate cinemas these days, where you see the trailer, you see the film.

          Aren't the issues under discussion a problem with the comics the films are based on?

          I don't read the comics, but after I see a movie I go read up on the topic on Wikipedia. Seems like nothing is permanent in the comic-verse.

          • There are a lot of great comic stories (and they don't have to be graphic novels). So far, Hollywood has yet to put any of them to good use.

        • If I had the budget, I'd film Mark Waid's "Irredeemable".

          • And "Incorruptible" for the counter-perspective and analysis of the true costs of redemption. Waid was brilliant in mapping the 12 steps to the theme of super-hero redemption.

        • Sounds like you, too, are ready to move on to Indy Cinema - those films where you have good cast, good direction and a story which could end in any way possible. Much more impressive than anything at the corporate cinemas these days, where you see the trailer, you see the film.

          Or, you end up watching something like Enter The Void [imdb.com], and wishing you could have the last 161 minutes of your life back.

          It may have been a good film, but it was well over 2 hours of film what was a cross between Midnight Express, Tra

          • I agree. There have been some arthouse films I thoroughly enjoyed, though. The Thin Red Line was very, very impressive on a big screen with good audio. Avatar was a long snooze by comparison. And the weird movie from David Lynch, Lost Highway... well, I can't say I knew what it was all about, but it had a plot, a start, some ending and it was a well made movie with a great soundtrack.

            Most other indy movies are meh... but so are a lot of big budget movies. I've been to Fortress (gawd that was so bad) and Spe

          • I'll queue up Porkys for ya.

        • Re: (Score:3)

          by mcmonkey ( 96054 )

          Here's a thought for a Super Hero film .. someone suddenly is born with super powers/finds a rune which grants powers/is bitten by a radioactive leech/what have you, they're SUPER now, in some capacity. They are the only one like them in the world of ordinary mortals. Have them explore their own moral code with what they could get away with or what wrongs they could right ("That b**tard Gahaffi, I'll just fly over and grab him and take him to the Hague! Up, up and away!") and finally have the film end on a note of remorse, loss or even death - (what will the world do now that Superperson is dead?)

          I'd like to see that .. done in a very serious manner, not with a bunch potty humor and in-jokes.

          Isn't that what Hancock did? Not 100% serious, but it did look at real-world consequences such as, yes Superman you stopped the train before it hit the car stalled on the tracks. Now can you help us clean up the wreck of a train that suddenly goes from 60 MPH to 0?

          • Hancock was disappointing. It could've been much better than it was and had some great elements in the character, but they mired it up with Charlize Theron's character not making much sense and the massive contrivance of the guys from prison deciding that they'll break out and kill the invincible guy with fucking guns (you know, the things that can't hurt him) right when he just happens to be vulnerable due to yet another contrivance in the script. I wanted that movie to be so much better than it was.

            But

            • The first fifteen premise-defining minutes of Hancock were fantastic. The delivery on that premise was awful.

              So yeah, so disappointing.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by RMingin ( 985478 )
          They made that movie. It was called Hancock, and got panned pretty hard. They did rehab the ending to Hollywood-happy at the last minute, but it otherwise follows your formula pretty closely. I rather liked it, but most folks didn't.

        • You know what? I tried watching independent films. What it taught me is that Hollywood knows what they're doing.

          There's a reason Hollywood films generally make a lot of money. They're well done and entertaining, they deliver a easy to watch story with characters that are easy to get into and a plot where you generally know the ending will turn out well.

          I've decided that I don't want to bother wasting hours of my life watching movies where, once I get to the ending, I as often as not want to throw the charac

    • Re:Impermanence of Sacrifice Bores Me (Score:4, Informative)

      by ackthpt ( 218170 ) on Monday June 20, 2011 @12:27PM (#36502708) Homepage Journal

      This past weekend I watched Twelve O'clock High. There's a movie about heroes and sacrifice. Probably one of the most honest war movies of the era.

    • Of course the ultimate example of what you are talking about is Lord of the Rings. [ducks]

      Granted it was written for children and still manages to hold itself up through pure imagination and exploration of a fantasy world - but I think it has set the tone for many fantasy/scifi stories since, including the ones you reference.

      If you watch children play with toys (or remember playing with them yourself, as I do) you'll notice a lot of parallels with modern day fantasy/hero movies - the hero is always put i

      • Of course the ultimate example of what you are talking about is Lord of the Rings. [ducks]

        If you read the stuff published posthumously, some of Tolkien's stuff is so grim that I find myself wondering whether he had psychological problems.

      • Well, there's Boromir. It was an important character in the story until he was killed, sacrificing himself.

      • Re:Impermanence of Sacrifice Bores Me (Score:5, Interesting)

        by obarthelemy ( 160321 ) on Monday June 20, 2011 @01:39PM (#36503854)

        I remember having a very strong sense of loss at several points while reading the books way back when: at the very end of the books, all elves and mages leave; bilbo repeatedly is described as dying soon; frodo too, and he takes the boat. The ones left behind do not fare much better, I remember feeling sad for Aragorn, essentially reigning over decay, and the remaining hobbits, once again ensconced in their little lives. The only ones who seem to fare OK are the dwarves, back into their mines.

        I found it much darker than comics, with their endless resurrections and deus ex machinas.

        • I found it much darker than comics, with their endless resurrections and deus ex machinas.

          I suppose "endless" is a matter of opinion but LOTR certainly has no shortage of either.

    • You aren't alone, but it's just personal preference.

      I like unpredictability and misery in my movies. I like my comedies dark. I am a big fan of unhappy endings.

      My wife likes predictability.

      To me, her movies seem like watching the same movie over and over. To her, she can't possibly see why I'd want to watch something that isn't relaxing and removed from reality.

      Other than causing endless conversations about how much each other's tastes suck, it's not a big deal. Just taste.

      • I like unpredictability and misery in my movies. I like my comedies dark. I am a big fan of unhappy endings.

        While I prefer unhappy endings, I should point out that there's such a thing as a happy but flawed ending. Where the hero wins but must make some sort of sacrifice. It might be their life, it might be someone they love ... hell, I would have been much more satiated with Thor's end of communication with the woman he loved. It's undoing the sacrifice that has made the hero what they are that bothers me. Many of my personal heroes in real life have made such drastic sacrifices through their lifetimes and i

        • Heh, you are preaching to the choir. She likes the predictable rush of insulin. And it seems so does most of the American audience. We're in the minority, but there are still plenty of films out there for us. :)

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by ackthpt ( 218170 )

        You aren't alone, but it's just personal preference.

        I like unpredictability and misery in my movies. I like my comedies dark. I am a big fan of unhappy endings.

        My wife likes predictability.

        To me, her movies seem like watching the same movie over and over. To her, she can't possibly see why I'd want to watch something that isn't relaxing and removed from reality.

        Other than causing endless conversations about how much each other's tastes suck, it's not a big deal. Just taste.

        Hollywood loves your wife's tastes and is catering to them, not yours. Interesting bit on the BBC this weekend, in analysis - many films are being geared to be friendly to the Chinese audiences - Hollywood knows where the money is.

        • Hollywood loves your wife's tastes and is catering to them, not yours. Interesting bit on the BBC this weekend, in analysis - many films are being geared to be friendly to the Chinese audiences - Hollywood knows where the money is.

          In some territories Pulp Fiction was re-edited so that all the segments followed in correct chronological order, as they didn't think the audience in those places would accept the events being told the way they were for the rest of us because their story telling traditions were far more fixed format-wise and the execs thought the disjoint style of the original edit would be too jarring for them to find interesting or enjoyable.

          Not quite the same as tweaking the standard edit we all see to account for pos

    • It's a very valid opinion, but you know how media producers cannot stay away from clichés. If sad, unhappy endings happened to be the standard, few movies would be worth watching. Pretty much the same as now but in reverse.

      Personally, I enjoy movies that have a good ending, but a hard-earned one.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by vlm ( 69642 )

      There's more sacrifice in real life than there are in modern movies.

      OK, agreed, but the business model is endless remakes / reboots / resets / reinterpretations.
      Lets consider a decent western from the end of the western era... how bout "The Shootist"

      Uh, I think thats gonna be a pretty hard sequel or reimagination task. Maybe the kid grows up to be a sniper in WWI and comes home to a "The Deer Hunter" crossover remake kinda thing? Maybe a Dune crossover where they clone the Shootist in to a Ghola and together with the Bene Geserit they save the town from ... uh, all the gu

    • Er... I can't speak for the Potter films, but in the book a number of good guy characters die by the end. I mean, geez, the story starts out with the main character's parents being murdered.

      That being said, you are correct in you rassessment of the Green Lantern and Hollywood in general.

    • There apparently isn't going to be a third Fantastic Four film. I doubt there will be a single sequel to Green Lantern. The Star Trek reboot must have not done well enough to get an immediate sequel either, and we're just coming up on the second attempt to reboot the Planet of the Apes, (apparently unconnected to the Ape Lincoln Memorial version).
      It's not just that sacrifice isn't permanent. Things don't get permanently changed in general. For the Fantastic 4 films, why not cure

    • So far as Thor goes, sacrifice was not one of the things that bothered me. I expected Odin to be fine, since it would otherwise be Ragnarok, and I expected Loki to survive, because Loki is the reason the Avengers were formed in the comics. A comic fan and a non-fan viewer will see two slightly different movies, because the viewer may wonder "when does the villain die" while the fan will wonder "how does this sync up with canon and the Avenger movie coming out next year."

      Thor was irritating to me only becaus

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by vlm ( 69642 )

        (*Sidenote: why on Earth does Yggdrasil need to be in the firefox spellcheck dictionary?)

        http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yggdrasil_Linux/GNU/X [wikipedia.org]

        It generally took the same beatings in the early 90s that Ubuntu took in the late 00s WRT to appealing to the n00bs, although they got some extra frying for trying to charge way too much money in a market where the competition was mostly free. They also got flamed for not including some source code, which wouldn't have been so bad if they weren't trying to overprice it.

        My personal, possibly faulty, recollections are it was more or less free SLS except it w

    • Your friends don't step in and save you at the end.

      It sounds like you need some better friends.

      Perhaps I'm too young, but I've had friends come traveling overnight by car to help me when I needed it. A friend from my childhood went out, got into heroin, watch a dozen people die in front of her, and has since rebuilt her life into a reasonable facsimile of success. Happy endings do happen, and people can be loyal. Now, granted, having the ability to rebuild a life usually requires good friends, and having good friends usually requires being a decent person i

      • It sounds like you need some better friends.

        Like the old saying goes:

        Friends help you move;
        Good friends help you move bodies.

      • It sounds like you need some better friends.

        As the other poster said, "friends help you move, good friends help you move bodies".

        That said, the big problem I have with friends is that it seems to me that you make your best friends when you're very young, and that it's really really hard to find new friends (the good kind, as defined above) later in life. Basically, it seems like you make your best friends either in grade/high school or in college, and once you're out in the "real world", that's it, because

    • Without revealing any spoilers I think you should watch The Dark Knight. I enjoyed that movie immensely because it doesn't do any of the things you described. There are still some good movies out there, but they're pretty damn rare these days.
    • I was really excited for the sequel to Wall Street. But it was a shithole.

      Gordon Gekko steals from his daughter, she disowns him, he turns that money into a trillion fucking dollars....donates an insignificant amount of that money to some bullshit cause, and they all make up....right at the end of the movie.

      It felt so 'tacked on' and pointless. Let the man be an asshole, that's why Michael Douglas won an academy award in the first one. He was heartless, and the plot wasn't so jarring. It didn't even
    • The endings you seek went the way of the grues.

      Now that being said - I can understanding why we don't have as many any more. Everyday life is filled with bad endings, bad choices, missed opportunities. Movies are an escape for a reason.

      Personally I like a mix. Game of Thrones is great for the reasons you describe; but I liked Thor's ending as well. The important part of Thor was that he didn't *know* his sacrifice wasn't permanent when he made it. The later impermanence of it is largely irreleva

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by elrous0 ( 869638 ) *

      It's just reflecting its comic book origins. No one ever really dies in comic books. No real sacrifices are made. Dead heroes are always brought back. Everything bad just turns out to be in some alternate universe. Pam always finds Bobby in the shower at the end.

      But if you want to cite the most egregious example of this, you have to go back a lot further than modern superhero movies. The "Oh, I'll just reverse time and take it all back" cheat ending of the original Superman in 1978 was the worst example by

    • Your friends don't step in and save you at the end and there aren't any phoenix tears to make everything instantly better. Lazy plot devices and disney endings are a dime a dozen--am I the only person that feels this way?

      Nope. Actions without consequences, success without sacrifice - all too annoyingly Disney for me. Some recent movies do buck this trend. Someone mentioned Black Swan; how about Body Heat (from way back when). For something a bit more classic, read/watch Hamlet (almost everyone dies) o

      • I also highly recommend the movie Rosencrantz & Guildenstern are Dead - haven't read the play, but imagine it's also good - which is Hamlet from the perspective of the supporting characters Rosencrantz and Guildenstern .

        The play is also really good, but also goes a little farther and to darker places. One difference I noticed (reading play and watching movie in close proximity) was that in the part with the players, and "The Rape of the Sabine Women... or rather Woman... or rather Alfred," Alfred isn't some weird looking goon, but rather a young boy. I guess they didn't want to broach the subject of underage male prostitution in the film.

    • more so than The Green Lantern or Harry Potter?

      I take it, you did not read the Harry Potter books and are only judging the movies. There is permanent loss in the sacrifices of Harry and the other wizards of the world - many die (including both his parents - at the very beginning) in the fight and a long repeated saying, even in the World of Magic, death is permanent, there is no coming/bringing someone back.

    • You're absolutely right. The simplistic and safe storylines in addition to constant, gaping plotholes are two big reasons why I haven't been motivated to watch movies in years. I'll catch something from time to time, although never in theaters. But generally, I always feel like most movies are patronizing the way everything is spoon fed to the audience.

      There are some indie gems, but a lot of that is lacking too, but for different reasons that the mainstream.

    • AGREED. Add "The Wrestler" to the list.

    • You missed the headmaster's death in the Harry Potter series somehow? Sure, its mostly happy endings but there are some real tragedies in the series as well. On a whole its better than many. Canon or not, Professor X and Jean Grey were both allowed to be destroyed in the third X-men movie as well.

      On the whole though I agree.

  • if you give it to a bunch of corporate suits and a squadron of rewriters, you get something boring like green lantern

    if you give a fistful of money to a director you trust, you get christopher nolan's the dark knight. that's the way!

    or... you may get ang lee's hulk. oh, oops

    so you don't want to trust quirky directors with tons of money... but you don't want boring vomitus from a squadron of executives

    so... split the difference. give jon favreau a wad of cash, but you attach some strings and keep yourself in

    • The deal with movies of comics these days seems to be make a cheesy attempt, rake in the millions based on the name, then wait 10 years and do it right and get everyone to see it done right. There are very few that do it right the first time.

      • i think you are referring to batman

        actually, the original 1989 was a pretty damn good movie. of course, totally different than dark knight, but good on its own merits in its own time. yes, by the time mr. freeze and poison ivy and bane and nippled suits showed up, it was suckage, but it took time to get there

        likewise, in a few iterations, nolan's batman universe will be suckage too, much like cameron leaving the terminator universe left it as suckage. let's hope nolan and thomas hardy can do something inspi

        • i think you are referring to batman

          actually, the original 1989 was a pretty damn good movie. of course, totally different than dark knight, but good on its own merits in its own time. yes, by the time mr. freeze and poison ivy and bane and nippled suits showed up, it was suckage, but it took time to get there

          Agreed. I like Nolan's take on Batman, but as far as I am concerned Michael Keaton is THE Batman of film. Kevin Conroy is my TV Batman (at least in voice).

          The first Michael Keaton Batman was great, and still holds up fairly well today. I can't think of many 80's action-type movies that hold up well over 20 years later. It was dark, action packed, and all out fun. The second one wasn't my favorite film but it was OK. After that it got progressively cheesier.

          • Amen. He's the only one who the dichotomy between Batman and Bruce Wayne.

          • The first Michael Keaton Batman was great, and still holds up fairly well today.

            I actually have been liking it less and less. It's certainly far better than the later abominations in the series. (Batman & Robin and Batman Forever are two of the worst movies ever IMO) But it's not far enough away from the campy TV version for my tastes. Plus it is too obvious that everything was done on a sound stage. Michael Keaton was fairly forgettable in the title role for me. He just didn't dominate the screen the way he did in other films. Jack Nicholson made a valiant effort for the ti

  • I guess I mostly found this movie entertaining because I went in expecting garbage, and was pleasantly surprised to find that unlike some other movies recently, there was a coherent plot, and the acting wasn't terrible. I concur that it wasn't as good as first class or thor, but I still found it to be an enjoyable movie, not half as bad as everyone seems to make it out to be.
    • Same here. I just didn't go into this (or Thor, or Iron Man, or Incredible Hulk, or any of them really) thinking I was going to get my Shakespear fix. Green Lantern was no worse than many of the superhero films of recent years and better than several. It just has enough flaws and to have arrived at the exact moment in time when the public has had enough and wants something more than what they're seeing on the screen. Marvel is about to deliver with Captain America and the upcoming Avengers tie-in picture. N

  • This is the problem with growing up - you return one day to see what they have done with your old comic book heroes. Nothing looks familiar, so you pass.

    If it were quirky or fun to watch I might go for it, but these very purposeful heroes of today's cinema are so preposterous I can't really stomach it (plus the cost of admission would buy me a pizza, which I'm sure to enjoy more fully.)

    Here's an exercise - stand on a street corner in your downtown area and try to visualize any of these "heroes" at work. T

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by vlm ( 69642 )

      (plus the cost of admission would buy me a pizza, which I'm sure to enjoy more fully.)

      What kind of theater charges so little to see a movie? Or you mean some kind of pro-rated monthly cost of a torrenting cablemodem instead of a theater? Around here actually attending a movie at a theater is more like a full homemade steak dinner... a nice london broil with homemade garlic butter slathered on after grilling to perfection and a homemade Caesar salad (well, maybe I'll buy the dressing) and some steak fries (oil the grates and grill until crispy of course) dipped in salsa instead of ketchup a

  • $200 million on that turkey? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Animats ( 122034 ) on Monday June 20, 2011 @12:29PM (#36502728) Homepage

    I can't see how they spent $200 million on that turkey. There aren't that many sets, and the big ones are obviously green-screen work. The alien city (?) is so fuzzy that it looks like bad video game art.

    The hero is a jerk. The villain is pointless. The Green Lantern corps meeting looks like a Nazi rally, fist-raising and all.

    Wait for the DVD, coming to a bargain bin near you soon. Maybe this will kill off the second-tier comic superhero genre for a while.

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by ackthpt ( 218170 )

      I can't see how they spent $200 million on that turkey. There aren't that many sets, and the big ones are obviously green-screen work. The alien city (?) is so fuzzy that it looks like bad video game art.

      Psst! Hollywood accounting. "Sorry we can't pay your bonus, the film lost money. Lolz."

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by localman57 ( 1340533 )

      Maybe this will kill off the second-tier comic superhero genre for a while.

      I hope not. If going to next year's big blockbuster requires me to watch Spiderman, Superman, or Batman's origin story again, I'll just stay home. At least with the 2nd tiers, you get a chance to do something new. Iron Man was a 2nd tier after all.

    • This movie is so hyped up, it's everywhere. I wouldn't be surprised if the marketing/advertising exceeded the cost of the actual film. Go have a look at the website for the film. The lenths they go to in order to try and establish something as legitimate before it even comes out is astounding.

  • The Onion (Score:5, Funny)

    by Xelios ( 822510 ) on Monday June 20, 2011 @12:31PM (#36502752)
    I thought their take on The Green Lantern [youtube.com] was pretty funny.

  • the other green movie..... (Score:3)

    by Spy Handler ( 822350 ) on Monday June 20, 2011 @12:34PM (#36502804) Homepage Journal
    green hornet... was better than this drivel... and that's saying alot considering how green hornet also sucked

  • Garbage (Score:5, Interesting)

    by redemtionboy ( 890616 ) on Monday June 20, 2011 @12:39PM (#36502906)

    Before you read this, understand I'm particularly harsh on films, but, with so many good films out there, it's not fair to treat the bad ones with a gentle touch.

    Personally I found the film to be quite bad. I went in there expecting nothing and still left disappointed. It's not that they didn't come up with a compelling story (they didn't). It's not that I never felt attached to any of the characters (I didn't). It's not even that so many of the lines and characters felt out of place (they do). It's that the film suffers from fluidity issues from the very beginning. I want to believe that there was a much more comprehensible film originally shot and then some jackass in the editing room decided to take out chunks of the film and slap it together so that it could be under 1:45, because the film feels jerked around and unnatural, not to mention the plot hole issues. There is a particular scene where right before Hal is chilling with his girl. Then, the villain attacks this underground military base where Hal has never been, and all of a sudden he bursts through the wall with no explanation as to how he got there or knew what was going on. After the battle is over, both the hero and villain are suddenly in their home, with no explanation as to how that happened. This is probably the worst it gets in the film, but that same lack of fluidity is what seeped into ever part of the film and made it a complete failure to me. That said, it's not the worst super hero film ever made. It's better than X-men 3 and Spiderman 3, but not by much. I give it a 4.5/10.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by pz ( 113803 )

      That was a better written review than Taco's.

      Thanks!

    • I would have had a much longer and grueling training sequence.

      Cut out the romance- I'm not anti-romance, but I get that in every other film. This is superhero fiction. Give me more god-like beings punching one another. It's not like Superman/Lois Lane where it's pretty ingrained into the mythos.

      Also cut the whole scientist infected by the yellow goo subplot. That seemed bolted on for no reason at all.

      The fallen Guardian as a villain was good idea, but make him less giant monster and more just misguided bast

  • I liked it. (Score:4, Interesting)

    by TechHSV ( 864317 ) on Monday June 20, 2011 @12:48PM (#36503040)
    I've been a Green Lantern fan for about 20 years. I can still remember going through the white boxes at the comic book store trying to find any issue that I missed. I liked the movie for what it was. They had to skim and condense many things from the GL lore, but explaining a history that begins at the big bang can really eat into the 2 hours that people will sit through a movie. The OP mentions that the GL Corps is played up to be a big deal and OA as being awesome as bad things. These are freaking awesome things, this isn't the Rascals club house. The cool part about Green Lantern is that imagination and will power can be used to do amazing things. Realizing this as a young geek reading comics was a huge deal for me and many others.

    To summarize, I thought the movie was fun enough for your average summer movie goer and did better than expected from the POV of a long time GL fan. I would have liked some more inside type of stuff thrown in (even a mention of Alan Scott), but it was still pretty freaking cool hearing the Oath in a movie.

    • Actually, I thought the concise introduction to the Corps at the beginning was pretty well done. Short and sweet and told you what you needed.

  • Unless you're a big fan, GL is one to skip (Score:3)

    by macwhizkid ( 864124 ) on Monday June 20, 2011 @12:55PM (#36503186)

    I was never a comic book fan, and I saw Green Lantern on Friday only because a group of friends who are fans wanted to see it. I knew I was in trouble when a dramatic voiceover introduced us to a solid dozen names and places, including the happy planet of intergalactic peacekeepers and the main arch-villain, who's names I promptly forgot.

    Not only did the story come with an enormous amount of baggage, but it made quite a mess of a story going forward. It seemed like the setting was driving the narrative instead of the other way around. As if some screenwriter was standing by with a stopwatch worrying that the audience will lose interest since Hal hasn't flown anywhere off planet for over two minutes.

    The never-ending fight scenes were made less dramatic by virtue of the fact that Hal's limitations were never really explained or explored. It wasn't even clear whether he knew himself. That really spoiled the movie for me more than anything else -- when Batman was pinned by Liam Neeson in the EL-train car, you knew that he was vulnerable, and it was that collateral of mortality that defined the character. Here, when the main character had no problem flying across the galaxy for a quick meeting with his idiot boss and was literally dodging asteroids in the climax, it wasn't so clear.

    • The never-ending fight scenes were made less dramatic by virtue of the fact that Hal's limitations were never really explained or explored. It wasn't even clear whether he knew himself. That really spoiled the movie for me more than anything else -- when Batman was pinned by Liam Neeson in the EL-train car, you knew that he was vulnerable, and it was that collateral of mortality that defined the character. Here, when the main character had no problem flying across the galaxy for a quick meeting with his idiot boss and was literally dodging asteroids in the climax, it wasn't so clear.

      Depending on the era: Green Lantern's vulnerability has been wood, yellow, or the emotion of fear. At one point any of those 3 would either injure them, drop their constructs, or make them ineffective. The "Fear" thing is the most recent one: if you can overcome it with a strong will then you're unstoppable.

      That is the problem with the "incredibly powerful super heroes" realm of comics. DC's roster of quite full of these insanely powerful being that might as well be the gods of old.

      Marvel's heroes are ra

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Shados ( 741919 )

        Wolverine has metal claws and healing factor

        In his more recent incarnations and especially in the movies, I don't think Wolverine is a good example of what you're trying to say... regenerating faster than he can be disintegrated by the phoenix force, a billion super powers based on his animal nature, being able to survive an adamantium bullet to the head point blank range and the worse that happens is he loses his memory... He's a bit over the top now.

        • To be fair, his skull was supposed to be plated with adamantium, which is supposed to be indestructible. So what's supposed to happen when you shoot an indestructible (but hollow) object with a bullet made from the same indestructible material?

          I would have preferred if they had just avoided that dilemma altogether. Better yet, they should have stuck with Brian Singer for directing all X-men sequels, because after he left they sucked.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Shados ( 741919 )

            Agreed, but in the movie's interpretation, they made it pretty damn clear: the bullet goes through and he regenerates with no damage except for his memory being lost. What happens to his skull being adamantium isn't the issue here: its that even after (what was it, 3-4?) a bunch of bullets in the head at point blank through his -brain-, he loses his memories and thats it.

            • I don't know that that's really over-the-top, given the premise that he has super-healing powers. If any of his tissues can regenerate quickly, the brain should be included in this. So if a bullet bounces around in there, but he's really able to regenerate any damaged cells within, say, 30 seconds, than any damaged neurons should be regenerated too, including those in the brain stem that control respiration and heartbeat (though obviously there'd be a little down time there, but normal humans can survive

  • I went in with good expectations (been reading Green Lantern and DC in general since I was a kid). It was a lot of fun, tons of great lines, and the VFX were interesting. Of course you can always armchair quarterback to say what you think would be better. Instead of watching it with that kind of critical eye, I decided I was going to go along for the ride. So worth it. Saw it in 2D and I want to see it in 3D.

    --kev

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