It’s unabashedly ludicrous and alarmingly uneven, but surprisingly, Green Lantern is not quite as godawful as it looks. There are other surprises, and they’re not all good. This is DC’s attempt to launch their third major comic-movie franchise. While Marvel may have them beat on quantity, with far more of the iconic characters and superhero teams, DC has the Big Two: Batman and Superman. They also have Wonder Woman, who’s never had a film treatment (and after that embarrassing attempt to reboot the television series, she probably never will). There’s Aquaman, already parodied with a fictional James Cameron adaptation on Entourage, and who has some amazing…fish powers, or something.
Let’s face it, DC’s offerings are mostly lame. Which brings us to Green Lantern. In the hands of veteran director Martin Campbell, this probably seemed like a safe bet on paper – this was the guy who successfully re-booted the James Bond franchise not once (GoldenEye) but twice (Casino Royale) – but an interstellar comic book franchise about a guy with a mystical power ring? Green Lantern ultimately falls prey to wanting it all: pleasing its hardcore fan base while trying to draw in the summer movie crowd, many of whom might be wondering if this is that one with Seth Rogen again.
Ryan Reynolds (still in bland quip-mode) plays test pilot Hal Jordan, an irresponsible charmer working for his old flame Carol Ferris (Blake Lively, out of her element), who’s about to take over her father’s aerospace company. She’s a fighter pilot too, joining Hal in a mock dogfight with some AI-powered drones. Hal botches the whole show by winning the game, driving off a juicy government contract. There are no real consequences for this, though, since the whole scene exists to “ground” us here on earth after a CGI-laden prologue set in the depths of the universe.
It turns out that a race of immortals called the Guardians created the cosmos, divided the universe into sectors and created the Green Lantern Corp to keep the peace. They reign atop a circle of stone pillars on the planet Oa, the Lanterns’ home base. Led by the noble Sinestro (the almost unrecognizable Mark Strong), the Green Lanterns have powerful rings which harness the “green power of will,” allowing them to conjure up anything their mind can imagine. If you’re already a fan of the comic book, you’ll be pleased to see the film follows the origin story fairly closely (while completely ignoring a much earlier version of the Green Lantern named Alan Scott, created by legendary Batman writer Bill Finger). Casual moviegoers with no knowledge of this mythology will quickly start rolling their eyes.
If it all sounds utterly preposterous…well, it is. So is the notion of a fast-healing mutant with indestructible metal claws and a screwed-up rich guy who dresses up like a bat to fight crime. The stars, director and producers of Green Lantern have been touting it as a “throwback,” which translates into “just have fun with it!” Sure, it can be fun – but most of the fun is the richly-imagined space elements, including the nasty, world-devouring Parallax, who escaped his plastic prison. This is actually a “lost planet” where the legendary Green Lantern Abin Sur (Temuera Morrison, showing us what Jango Fett would look like if flayed alive) imprisoned him. Parallax, gaining his strength through the “yellow power of Fear,” hisses through space to get his revenge on, mortally wounding Abin Sur and driving him to Earth, where he looks for the right will to wield his ring.
Enter Hal, who is whisked away to Oa once chosen by the ring to start his training. And it all gets very silly, very quickly. The CGI actually looked good, but when viewed through the pointless, migraine-inducing 3D, the human elements seemed cheesily grafted on and even the practical effects were rubbery. Was it all more believable in 2D? I’ll never know, because I don’t want to see it again. There are four writers credited for the screenplay, and three for the screen story, and while this mish-mash of ideas flows far better than the insipid Thor, there are clearly great whacks of character development left out. Specifically, a background rivalry for Carol between Hal and Dr. Hector Hammond (Peter Sarsgaard, taking away the acting honors for this one, whatever that’s worth). One brief scene establishes that Carol, Hal and Hector (son of Tim Robbins‘s Senator Hammond) grew up together, and once Hector is infected with a bit of Parallax residue, gives in to the power of fear and is suddenly telekinetic.
In other words, a giant batch of “whatever.” This film is further proof (along with Thor and Rise of the Silver Surfer) that comic book movies are best left here on earth. What about the upcoming Man of Steel, you say? Well, Superman seems to be the exception, and while I had my doubts that Christopher Nolan‘s “let’s get gritty” influence will successfully translate over to Supes, I’m changing my mind. When left to bound into the physics-defying, groan-inducing, fanbase-pandering realm of Green Lantern, we’re left with a dopey pile of celluloid dross. Matthew Vaughn, the director of the superior X-Men: First Class, has famously predicted that Hollywood is about to kill the superhero-movie genre. Along with Thor, Green Lantern will hopefully be the opening salvo of that death-rattle.