Green Lanterns #7

Jessica looks like she's wearing a waistcoat and Simon looks like an idiot.

The Commentary!
• The issue begins with Jessica battling her anxiety. This is why Narration Boxes are so annoying. With them, I have to read about her struggle to just get the fuck in the other room and deal with Simon's family. I would rather not have to be inside of her head as she did that because I'm really inside of Sam Humphries' head and I don't think he understands what it's like to have anxiety at all! He needs the Narration Boxes so he can keep speaking directly to the reader, saying things like "See? See? She's struggling so hard with her anxiety! That's a thing she has and you can tell because I'm telling you about it! Constantly! See how she's having a tough time being around Simon's family? Oh, but you don't know it's Simon's family yet since you're a big fucking moron dope asshole! You probably think she's trying to work herself up to do some Green Lanterning, right? What a fucking idiot! Ha ha! Dope! I'm such a good writer I bet nobody at all guessed that her anxiety was keeping her from just an every day interaction! Surprise!" I hope that isn't what Sam was actually thinking because I haven't even turned the page yet and I just blatantly put all of my Grandmaster Comic Book Reader Cred on the guess that that's what's happening. You know why? Because I don't think this opening fooled fucking anybody. Maybe it wasn't supposed to! But it's certainly written like it's some big twist cold open!

• Yeah, it turns out Jessica was just getting up the courage to be around Simon's family. It didn't even have anything in particular to do with Rami the Rogue Guardian who is a fucking lunatic.

• Oh, also this story was called "Family Matters". That was probably a big clue too! But I completely forgot it was called that because when I was absorbing every detail on the cover to come up with a caption, I was mostly absorbing Jessica's camel toe.

• Jessica chickens out and teleports out of the house to get away from the family. What does she think she is? An Indigo Lantern?! You can't teleport, you dumb barn owl.

• I get it, Jessica. I can't stand to be around people I don't know either! And this situation is extra bad because you're spending time with a Muslim family. And you know what that means! No alcohol to take the fucking edge off! You, Jessica, are fucked.

• One of the main reasons I hate being around new people is that most of them ask all of the same questions about things I'm not interested in. I don't want to talk about my family. I don't want to talk about my stupid job. I don't want to talk about how good I am at the sexing. I just want to listen until somebody says something dumb, leaving me an opening to tear them the fuck apart.

• Simon promises Jess that she doesn't have to spend any time with his family if she helps him make dessert in the kitchen. She agrees because cookies. That makes her adorable, I guess. I fucking hate all of these "this character is so fucking adorable" shortcuts that get fangenders into a tizzy. Ugh. Fuck you.

Gross. Put a shirt on.

• Simon tastes the dough and finds it lacking, so now he takes off. Dude, you probably got some tit sweat in it. Nobody wants to eat your stank ass shirtless cookies.

• Oh my god! Somebody call the Guinness Book of World Records! It turns out Simon Baz doesn't have Daddy Issues at all! He's a Mommy Issues Boy!

• Jessica talks Simon back into the kitchen and convinces him to make the cookies in his Green Lantern costume. It might look stupid but at least he's got a shirt on.

• Simon hasn't told his mom that he's a Green Lantern yet. So he figures now's the time!

Fucking hell. You couldn't have left the gun off?!

• With Jessica's help, Simon manages to impress his mom with his cookies and his costume and, I guess, his gun. For some reason his mother puts up with his nonsense instead of rushing straight through the house to find her grandson. What kind of grandmother is she?! The worst, that's what kind!

• Her grandson is busy stacking things on Rami the Rogue Lantern. I guess the family doesn't have a cat.

• Rami wakes up and screams that the Dominators are coming before rushing off. I don't know where he's going. Wouldn't his precious Phantom Ring be safer with two Green Lanterns guarding it? Also, if anybody can use the Phantom Ring, why doesn't he use it to protect it? It must have some serious side effects that he isn't willing to deal with. Better to just find some sucker to test out the ring for him.

• The Dominators are those yellow aliens with lots of teeth and big red spots on their heads. I think they're supposed to be super scary.

The Ranking!
+1! I'm giving it a plus one because it's gotten much better now that Simon and Jess are friends. Plus, Sam really isn't relying on Narration Boxes like he did when they had to think opposite thoughts so the reader understood how different they were.

Green Lanterns #2

Bleez always looks like she forgot to put on the skirt before leaving the house.

The Review!
It's the buddy cop Green Lantern mash-up you've all been waiting for! One is a street wise misogynistic rookie! The other is an agoraphobic Islamaphobe who's an even rookier rookie! Together, they're Green Lanterns! Green both because they're rookies and because they're in that Corps whose power is based on willpower! The characters might not actually be as misogynistic and Islamaphobic as I'm pretending they are. Since the basic concept of the comic book revolves around neither one liking the other too much and how they're constantly criticizing the other in their inner monologues, I feel it's more exciting to spice up the mistrust they feel for each other. Plus neither one of them is a white guy, so I think if I write conversations where they criticize each other in ignorant ways, it's punching parallel! Which is okay, right? Or is it still wrong because I'm writing it? What if I scream that it's parody and satire and other stuff that used to be okay but now gets people angry for different reasons!? I think I get a free pass about knowing right from wrong because according to all the Youthsplanations I receive every day, I'm always wrong about everything (except my mistrust of the cops! That just keeps getting proven time and time again! Although I don't want to turn a daily tragedy into about me being right yet again! At least I do but I want to acknowledge that I didn't mean to do that but still do it anyway!) I'm even going to be told I'm wrong by an old white guy when I read Green Arrow next!

The Commentary!
This issue begins on the planet Ysmault which is identified as the "home of the Red Lanterns" instead of explaining which sector it is located. It's Sector 2814, by the way. Don't believe the incorrect information being passed around by Issue #1! I'm not sure why the comic begins on Ysmault since Red Lanterns was cancelled. And I'm fairly confident that "Green" is not a synonym for "Red" so I'm confused. I guess DC Comics just doesn't know how to let the Red Lanterns go. What makes them so special? The Indigo Lanterns have pretty much vanished and all but one of the Blue Lanterns have been killed by bugs and/or Twat Lobo. The only Orange Lantern has been relegated to jokey comic books and the Star Sapphires are pretending to have Tupper Ware parties but they're really having sex with hot space guys behind the Guardians' backs.

I'd hate to sit on a subway next to Atrocitus.

Back in Pima County, Arizona, Sector 2814, Atrocitus's Hell Tower begins erupting. Simon Baz and Jessica Cruz aren't around to help because they weren't Green Lantern enough for ARGUS. ARGUS must have forgotten their Secret Police Tape to close off the crime scene because dozens of citizens are standing around the Hell Tower when it erupts. Now dozens of citizens, along with the ARGUS agents, are really mad for no reason at all! Unless the Hell Tower is the reason. And maybe their dead family members.

Up in Portland, Oregon, a lot of douches are thinking they're cool, especially the one that lives in the apartment beneath me. I wonder how many people reading this are from Portland, living beneath somebody else, and are now wondering if that's Tess up there? Also happening in a Lexmart in Portland, Jessica Cruz is introducing herself to the readers and having a nice little About Me chat with them. It doesn't make any sense. Does she know she's in a comic book and that I just turned the page to see her for the first time this month? I would think she would be too concerned with all of the angry shoppers that were attacking her for no reason at all. Really no reason this time! She's not in the Hell Tower or Dead Family Members Aisle.

Jessica's sister has become the Angriest Shopper in the World and Jess doesn't know how to help her. Oh yeah, Jessica also mentions her anxiety so that readers suffering from anxiety can be all, "Cool! Representation! Except for that part about how she totally hasn't been crippled by her anxiety at all in her Justice League adventures! Probably because Volthoom was controlling her! Also, what did she mean by her sister made her leave her apartment even though she was crippled by anxiety? Fuck saving that cunt! How dare she!?" It's about at the time I thought "Should I include the word 'cunt' in my imaginary reader's thoughts?" when Simon Baz comes crashing through the wall of a store in a Light Construct Humvee to save the day!

When Jess sees Si, she thinks, "Look at how violently he just entered the store? Religion of peace, my big brown ass!" And Simon Baz is thinking:

"Religion of pieces, more like! SMASH! BANG! BOOM!"

Apparently Sam Humphries thematic element tying this series together is explained in this moment as Simon arrives. I said "apparently" when I probably should have said "undoubtedly and without question" because Jess thinks, "I might be all anxiety, but he's all impulse. Somewhere in the middle is where a Green Lantern should be." So that's why they were forced to share a Lantern! Because they're representative of two halves of one mind. So it's like The X-Files but less subtle or interesting!

Not that I'm totally disinterested in this comic book but it is doing a few things I could do without. How about more funny light constructs and less interior monologues about the differences between Si and Jess? Or maybe more interior dialogues between the two but make them more hate-filled and racist! I don't mean because I enjoy those things! I just mean because I would think it was funny if they were both ignorant assholes who eventually learn to not be ignorant because of interacting with each other and space travel! They'll still be assholes though.

Who the fuck is Simon talking to? I hate these kinds of fucking Narration Boxes! HE SHOULD NOT BE AWARE OF ME WATCHING HIM!

Jessica has been having trouble making light constructs because of her anxiety or something. She's so full of self-doubt that she can't even make a butterfly net to catch her sister. A butterfly net is like Green Lanterning 101! It's like the elephant lamp that you pull the trunk and the light comes on of Green Lantern Shop Class! But she's too scared of hurting her sister so impulsive Simon Baz has to swing into action and help out. He puts Sara Cruz in suspended animation that should keep her safe while he and Jess fly into space to fight Red Lanterns. On his way out of the Lexmart, he steals a stuffed animal and crashes through the roof. I want to complain about how irresponsible he is for a peacemaker in a position of authority but how can I when he's at least not killing the people he's supposed to protect. I just can't get angry at a space cop stealing a teddy bear when actual cops are stealing lives.

Simon and Jessica realize the Red Lanterns are invading Earth with their hate. They don't have time to stop them this issue even though Aquaman took care of his first problem in only two issues. Although Black Manta was freed before getting to prison, so once he's done feeling like he wasted his life trying to kill Aquaman, he'll get right back up on that Aquaman killing hobbyhorse, I'm sure. Hopefully next issue begins with Simon and Jessica charging their rings so that they don't wind up in the usual shitty Green Lantern cliffhanger where the ring is running out of power. Although Simon still has the gun strapped to his thigh, so he can at least find out if bullets can kill Atrocitus. I bet they work against the cat!