Green Lantern
Expected: June 19th, 2020
Character: Hal Jordan, an Air Force test pilot known for his fearlessness.
Origin: Green Lanterns are a space-faring police force assembled by the ancient and wise Guardians of the Universe to protect all 3,600 sectors of space in the known universe, and Abin Sur – one of the greatest of all Green Lanterns – crash lands on Earth. Dying, his ring of power searches to find a worthy successor and chooses Jordan – the first human to wear a Green Lantern ring. Subsequently, he joins the Corps.
Powers: The Green Lantern ring of power grants the wearer the ability to create constructs made of green energy. In addition, the rings grant the power of flight and can protect the Lanterns with force fields. As the key to its use is will power, the ring functions according to the wearer’s own self-discipline – the greater their control and concentration, the greater the effectiveness of the ring. However, the rings are vulnerable to anything yellow, and are rendered ineffective against it.
Greatest enemies: Sinestro is perhaps first and foremost amongst Green Lantern’s adversaries, all the more so because he trained Jordan during his induction into the Green Lantern Corps. Another is Parallax – not the lame giant cloud Parallax from the Green Lantern movie, but a symbiotic creature who can induce fear and possess even the most heroic individual. Sinestro and Parallax would eventually come together to create the Sinestro Corps – an antidote to the Green Lanterns with yellow power rings fuelled by fear. That’s probably enough villainy for at least a couple of movies right there.
Casting: Ryan Reynolds brought humor to the part in 2011, but Green Lantern’s not known for his sense of funny. You need someone of the young, square-jawed hero sort. Chris Pine or Tom Hardy come to mind. Or, if Warner Bros. wanted to break barriers further, they could skip Jordan and bring in John Stewart, who’s African-American and already has a following because he was the Green Lantern of note in the Justice League animated series. Perhaps John Boyega or David Oyelowo would be interested in putting on the ring of power.
History and future: Basically, the first Green Lantern movie should be “Training Day in Space.” It begins with a man who joins a police force and feels overwhelmed by the pressure and responsibility, only to learn that his partner and mentor is corrupt and has very personal and destructive goals aside from “serve and protect.” Green Lantern is one of DC’s best-selling comics of the last 10 years, and one that’s fairly easy to adapt when you start thinking about the likes of Aquaman or Cyborg. With Marvel proving that there’s a big audience appetite for space-faring adventure with Guardians of the Galaxy, Warner Bros. would be crazy not to put their all into rebooting this particular franchise properly.
– Adam Donaldson
