Edge of Oblivion #6

And they all died happily ever after.

The Review!
This final issue was a good issue. Each subsequent issue of this series just got better and better as it dragged itself further and further away from the terrible reason it exists, Lost Army. My highlights in this issue were Simon Baz saying a thing that a lot of people really need to hear this week, Guy Gardner being the heroic Guy Gardner who can sometimes be an ass but never lets that interfere with rescuing the innocent and helpless, and Xrill's declaration of love for 2-6-8-1-7-9-5.

The Commentary!
Last issue ended with the revelation that Ausras and Dismas were actually Langoliers. Their job is to finish eating the last of Relic's universe so that the next universe has room to come into existence. It's quite an important job on a omniversal scale! Which doesn't make it surprising when the Green Lanterns decide to stop them. Why are they messing with the natural ebb and flow of cosmic life? This is like when Swamp Thing tried to destroy the Rot! If he got rid of rotting things, where would the Green most of their nutrients?! What about the Grey? Without the Rot, the Red's herbivores would never die and consume what's left of the Green! It's all part of the natural system and while everybody can battle to maintain balance, nobody can outright defeat anybody else or everybody dies.

You might be thinking, "But Tess? Why don't you post naked pictures of yourself?" Or you might have actually been paying attention to what you were reading in the previous paragraph instead of fantasizing about seeing me naked and thought, "But Tess! You don't know if the Blackest Knights are part of the cosmic cycle or just parasites bringing this universe to an early end!" Sure, I don't know that! But I'm going to assume it so that I can write about how terrible the Green Lanterns are at their job! They're going to destroy their own universe by defeating the Cosmic Langoliers who are helping to bring the Lanterns' universe into existence! Probably!

You know who hasn't been seen in five or six issues? Relic and Krona! Hopefully they're finding a way back to the DC Universe and not just sucking each others' dicks. I mean, I hope that for the sake of the Green Lantern Corps! If I were hoping for my own entertainment, I would be crossing my fingers for the dick sucking thing.

You know who else we haven't seen for awhile? B'dg and Arisia! Oh, wait. Never mind.

The Oliver Twist of Green Lanterns is the first killed in the battle (I mean, the first acknowledged. Some others may have been swallowed whole). After her faceplant into the planet's surface, her ring rushed off to find Sector 2619 (which totally doesn't exist). But the ring believed it existed for some unfathomable reason, so Simon Baz decided to follow it to whatever wormhole it sensed which led to the DC Universe. My bet the wormhole is the hole at the end of Krona's worm, if you get my dirty meaning!

Eventually, Simon Baz figures out where the rings are going.

I'm going to start referring to my asshole as a tear in space. "Doctor! Your finger's in another dimension!" Other things that have gone into that other dimension: my own finger and the tip of a smooth black cylindrical vibrator.

Simon Baz decides to head into the breach and try to report back to Guy what's on the other side. As he does this, he gives an example of what I appreciate about his character.

In Green Lanterns Rebirth #1, Simon Baz is the guy Johns and Humphries express his hope that Jessica Cruz's ring was Guy's ring because Guy had died. They couldn't have missed the point of Simon Baz more. And Johns created him! I think.

Baz's reconnaissance doesn't go great. But since the space fissure is the only place left to go, the Green Lanterns decide to fly into it. But first they have to save the last city of Relic's universe. I suppose they'll stick it on Mogo and Mogo will become the setting for a Green Lantern: Mosaic Rebirth comic book? I hope?

Oh? A mosaic, you say?!

The Lanterns manage to get the Cosmic Langolies onto the surface of Mogo's new friend, the planet Perduron. She gets them in a continental bear hug and traps them in Relic's universe as it dies around them. The Lanterns, meanwhile, flee into the space fissure and escape. Probably. I mean, Simon Baz was in Green Lanterns Rebirth #1 and all.

Edge of Oblivion #5

Time to choose sides, bitches! I'm with the sentient onion! Or is that a jellyfish wearing a turtleneck? Am I being insensitive to aliens who look like rolled up socks with tassels?

The Review!
It's probably too late to tell people not to buy this comic book, right? Not that it's awful or anything. I mean, it might be but I'm not really judging it on its own merits. Maybe that's not fair but I also don't think it's fair for DC to sell me a comic book series that only exists because they already sold me a comic book series that was fucking horrible and was cancelled because it was fucking horrible and yet because of its existence, DC needed another story to fix what happened to the characters in that horrible, horrible story by Cullen Bunn. So now here I am paying for Tom Taylor's version of cleaning up after Cullen Bunn clogged the Green Lantern Corps' toilet which overflowed all over the DC Universe. I mean, DC really couldn't leave that disgusting mess just lying there, right?

The Whatever!
I often joke about how inconsequential everything I do is and then I remember that I'm wrong about that. I'm doing important work here. I'm doing better work than the media is doing. Because the thing corporations don't want anybody to be is open and honest about their products. Nobody wants to see somebody daily pissing all over the thing that makes them money (unless you sell urinals, I suppose). The main problem is that comic books are inconsequential. I know, I know. Super heroes and geek hobbies have taken over popular entertainment. But comic books are just a fringe outlier of super hero movies. Most people don't walk out of Civil War and think, "Now I want to experience that in a more boring version where I have to actually read!" I guess what I'm trying to say is that I should piss all over movies instead of Cullen Bunn! I mean comic books! Although I sort of want to make a movie short about pissing all over Cullen Bunn now. I wonder if he'd enjoy that? I hope that I wouldn't enjoy it too much or I wouldn't be able to piss, if you get that I mean that it's impossible to piss with a raging boner.

But seriously, I'm doing better, more honest work than most media outlets. Nobody owns this critic! Also nobody pays this critic. I wonder if I could get a decent paying job writing stupid puns about movies and going really easy on them and pretending everything I see for free is Citizen Kane? Who am I kidding? Pretending every movie were Citizen Kane would mean I'd have to say I didn't understand what I didn't sleep through! I probably should have said, "Pretending everything I see is Young Guns II!" Now that was the perfect movie! And the soundtrack?! Magnifique!

This issue begins with Guy Gardner realizing he was used by one group of aliens and now he's ready to be used by those aliens' enemies. But it's okay this time because he's probably fighting on the right side this time. It's Issue #5 so I don't think there will be yet another twist where it's revealed that the good aliens who were discovered to actually be the bad aliens really do turn out to be the good aliens. I really don't care if that happens because I don't care about anything that happens in this universe. The whole concept was a terrible idea in the first place.

You know that whole "in media res" thing where a story teller is supposed to begin the story in the middle of the story because it's way more exciting that way? I wish comic books would do that! I mean really do that! Not this bullshit "first page begins in the middle of the action and then by the second page we jump the narrative back to the beginning to over-explain how things got to page one". I just want comic books to stop filling shit in that doesn't need to be said because then we get comic books like this. I got it! Relic came from a universe that used up all of its light and was destroyed (although, I feel the need to state, yet again, that they theory never had any actual evidence to support it and this series only proved that Relic's theory was verified by John Stewart saying he was from the future and repeating Relic's theory to him). That's all I needed to know! Got it! I understand the motivations of the character. I don't need an entirely new series where people venture into that universe and go, "Oh yeah! Look at that! Relic's universe where everything is coming to an end! I'm sure glad this boring fucking story was told!"

Some of the Lanterns are still under the influence of the Blackest Knights so it's time for Green Lanterns to battle Green Lanterns. Being that 2-6-8-1-7-9-5, Guy Gardner, Kilowog, and Simon Baz are on one team, my money is on that team. Not that I think they're better than the other team but I can only name John Stewart in the other team so it must not be as good.

Earlier, John said Kilowog knows all of the Lanterns' weaknesses because he trained them. So Kilowog creates one of those things that moo like a cow when you turn it over? That's John Stewart's weakness?

I just recently rewatched that scene in Delicatessen where they're making those Mooing cylinders or else I might have thought it was a salt shaker and deemed John Stewart a space slug.

Guy's plan is to lead the Blackest Knights into space where Mogo can go all Death Star on them. When Mogo accomplishes this, Ausras and Dismas's disguises fail them.

Oh, well if they look like that, they're obviously the monsters! Although I probably shouldn't think that having just read Meredith Finch's treaty on superficiality leading to leaps in judgment in her most recent story in Wonder Woman.

I suppose it isn't so much that Ausras and Dismas actually look like gigantic blow-job space piranha so much as they declare they're going to feast on the universe that blows their cover. Plus as I learned in the pages of Superman and the Truth storyline, if somebody is hiding who they really are, they're horrible monsters bent on total destruction, no matter how much their actions say different.

Edge of Oblivion #4

I never realized what a high percentage of Guy's costume was turtle neck and collar.

The Review!
I don't really care what happens in this comic book. Reading this comic book is like watching somebody mop up after a drunk asshole pisses all over the bathroom floor. Basically something occurred that should not have occurred and now Tom Taylor has to clean it all up before people begin to think that the bathroom floor has always been covered in Cullen Bunn's piss. Eventually the Corps will get back to the proper universe and everybody will forget that this little side adventure was ever pitched and somehow received as a good idea. On the plus side, Tom Taylor does the best job he can with a mop and a floor covered with piss. He even manages to wring one more twist out of the Green Lantern Mythos by making the bad guys who the Lanterns thought were the good guys into the super bad guys known as...The Blackest Knights! I bet Geoff Johns heard that and was all, "What?! Why didn't I think of that!" Of course Johns may have thought of it since I didn't read any of his ten year long run (Preboot, of course). Also, the Blackest Knights are a thinly veiled analogy of the United States foreign policy of constant war and imperialism while Marniel represents the powerless resorting to terrorist acts to do what they think is right. Of course, it all leads to a big fight between the Green Lanterns, some who have been brainwashed by Western propaganda and others who see the truth! Not that I'm judging anything in any way! I'm just describing what this book is about!

So basically, if you hate America, you should love this book! There might be other reasons to love this book too but I wouldn't know what they are. I just know this book keeps reminding me that Lost Army was a thing. A horrible, horrible thing.

Edge of Oblivion #3

When did Guy begin wearing a sheet of metal around his stomach?

Rating: -1 Ranking.

The Green Lantern Corps are still in another universe. They're still confused. Their rings still fail to work against the story's main enemy. And I'm still bored.

At this point in my life, I don't know what kind of crazy space adventure the Green Lantern Corps could participate in that would make me happy. But I do know that this story is simply the story which needed to be written because DC decided Cullen Bunn's idea of sending the Green Lantern's into Relic's universe was not the total shit idea it turned to be. So now DC had to publish a new story to fix that story. And to prove that the Green Lantern Corps are in a really dire situation (since, you know, being in a universe that's going to end in four days doesn't quite ramp up the tension enough), a few well-known Green Lantern Corps members had to die. Although they were just the weird fish guy, the talking squirrel, and the member who reminded everybody that Hal Jordan is a pedophile. So no big loss, I guess?

Edge of Oblivion #2

Don't worry, Lantern Fans! John doesn't die! Not in this issue, anyway.

Rating: -1 Ranking.

I suppose if I wanted to read a story where a bunch of fairly well-known Green Lanterns die, this is the comic book which I would pick up. But I don't want to read that story. I bet Cullen Bunn is pissed that he didn't get to be the one to kill Muk-Muk, Arisia, and B'dg! That's his go-to move to make an exciting comic book! Kill somebody so the readers think that nobody is safe! It really increases the dramatic tension for those readers who actually believe that any character could die at any time. But those readers are idiots. All it really does is piss off fans of the characters that were killed to make it seem like the main characters aren't as safe as the audience might have thought! It's disingenuous and mean-spirited!

Here's the way I see it! I don't feel like Guy Gardner is in any real trouble. Maybe John Stewart is because the editors at DC seem to want to kill him for some reason (racism, probably). So killing Muk-Muk, Arisia, and B'dg doesn't change my feelings about Guy's safety. Which means they're killed for no reason at all.

On the other hand, there are a lot of Green Lanterns and I guess some of them should die some times. But should Tom Taylor be the one doing it? It's as if he's painted himself into a corner and people expect him to kill off a character or two along the way. Does he really want to be that writer? I know Cullen Bunn does but then Cullen Bunn is just desperate to be known as any kind of writer, even a bad one! Which he is! Congratulations!

The main problem with this story is that it never should have even begun in Green Arrow Convergence #2! DC really needs to stop greenlighting projects when the pitch is one stupid question which I'm sure Lost Army was: "What if the Green Lanterns wound up in Relic's universe?! OMG!"

Edge of Oblivion #1

What's Kilowog been smoking?

Rating: 20 of 52 or so. Thankfully, Edge of Oblivion mostly ignores the events that took place in Lost Army. All of the main points are still valid. The Corps are stuck in another universe that's dying. They're hanging out on Mogo. A bunch of them are still lost. But so far there was no mention of the Peak Light Problem that's killing the universe, no sign of Relic, no Krona, and no Light Pirates. Some of that stuff might come up but it's taking a back seat to a new conflict.

The Green Lantern Corps are still trying to find a way home but now that have a New 52 Mosaic planet to take care of as well. But it isn't only good, well-meaning refugees on this Mosaic! No way! That would be boring! There are also some fish killers who murdered Mukmuk! Which seems kind of cruel and unecessary. Why kill the fish guy?! Fucking Tom Taylor is racist against fish, that's why. Jerko.