Adaptations of DC comics are faring much better on TV than they are on the big screen, and Doom Patrol’s endless quirkiness marks it as one of the most interesting. Diane Guerrero, who plays the dissociative identity disorder-afflicted Crazy Jane on the series and is one of its highlights, has now put herself forward to play Jessica Cruz whenever DC actually manage to get another live action Green Lantern up and running.
During a Doom Patrol Twitter Q&A session, Guerrero was asked which DC character she would choose to play, with her answer being quite emphatic.
Jessica Cruz, Green Lantern! That's my next DC character, just to put it out there…
DG https://t.co/dbAa0DTfxy— Doom Patrol (@DCDoomPatrol) July 12, 2020
A recent addition to the canon, Jessica was first introduced in 2014, and unlike most Green Lanterns had the mantle forced upon her. Prior to gaining abilities, she was badly traumatized after witnessing her friends being murdered by gangsters when they stumbled across a body being disposed of, and after barely escaping, developed crippling anxiety and agoraphobia, and shut herself off from the world.
After the death of Power Ring, Hal Jordan’s evil Earth-3 counterpart, the villain’s eponymous artifact homed in on her perpetual fear and after possessing and torturing her used her to cause wanton destruction. With the arrival of the Justice League, Batman used himself as an example that fear doesn’t need to define a person, but that greater strength can be found from facing and overcoming it, whereupon she broke the ring’s influence and was taught to control its power by Hal.
If Jessica is introduced into the DCEU, Guerrero actually has an advantage in getting the role in having already played her. Not to mention Cruz clearly struck a chord with her if she’s so keen to return to the part. She voiced the character in animated movie Justice League vs. the Fatal Five, where she was central and integral to the plot that partially dealt with her past trauma and current mental faculties.
Like Jane, Jessica is someone whose state of mind prevents her from living a normal life, and as such makes her eminently more relatable than many other superheroes. Not everyone has experience of what it’s like to be a test pilot or a marine, but many of us have had our lives hamstrung by varying degrees of mental illness, thus Jessica lets us see ourselves in her, and who better to realize that character than someone who has already memorably done so? Being a Green Lantern is not about having no fear, but rather defying its insidious insistence that they aren’t good enough to face whatever challenge lies before them, and in that, Jessica often embodies the creed more than anyone.
