Green Lantern: New Guardians #40 Review and *SPOILERS*

Written By: Justin Jordan
Art By: Diogenes Neves, Roge Antonio, Marc Deering, Daniel Henriques, Wil Quintana
Cover Price: $3.99
Release Date: March 18, 2015

Life Goes On

*Non Spoilers and Score At The Bottom*

It's the final issue of New Guardians and with it the ultimate fate of our White Lantern: Kyle Rayner.  In the last issue we saw that our hero had his hands full as Oblivion (the dark side of Kyle Rayner brought into existence with the Life Equation) tried to destroy our hero in what came off as a almost noble act.  As we all saw in the New Guardians Futures End tie in, Kyle becomes a bit of a power hungry god Five Years From Now and Oblivion actually wants to prevent this by killing Kyle.  Don't worry though, Kyle has himself some friends, so even though we saw the life being sucked out of our hero at the end of last issue we also saw the cavalry coming to his rescue........... No, not the Corps but it's an impressive group consisting of the Guardians, Saint Walker, Saysoran, Carol Ferris and Exeter.  Let's check this out and see if our heroes can overcome or if we're left with nothing but Oblivion.

Explain It!:

Our story begins like the last issue ended, with Kyle's friends coming to his rescue and man were they right in the nick of time because Kyle looks like he was cursed by an old gypsy.......... That was a Thinner reference........ Really though, Kyle looks like he's a damn corpse at this point and it's a good thing that he was saved.  The rest of the group do their damnedest to try and take Oblivion down while Carol gets Kyle to safety but it really looks like a lost cause because for as much power that they throw at the villain, he just keeps getting stronger and continually goes after Kyle.

Eventually, after everyone talks Kyle out of sacrificing himself to save the day, our hero gets his thinking cap on and comes up with a way to save the day and his own life while he's at it.  He uses the technique that he learned on New Genesis and telepathically connects with the Guardians so that they can do something completely new............. Well, at least in the New 52.  To stop the terrible future that we saw in the Futures End tie-in, Kyle takes the Life Equation and puts parts of it in seven different rings and then sends them out to recruit the White Lantern Corps.  While we get members like Saysoran and Exeter, we also get new cast members like Tallahe of Fifth Sline Seven, Romgan Shay of The Nest and Telos Usr of Daxam.

In the end, the new White Lantern Corps comes to the rescue of the rescuers and with the Life Equation out of Kyle's hands, Oblivion becomes no more and falls apart.  Our new White Lanterns go off to do White Lantern things and the mysterious seventh White Lantern ring is revealed to be the ring that Kyle was going to give Carol....... On one knee.  Don't worry all you Hal supporters, even though it was a grand gesture and our two heroes leave this series still in love; Carol turns down the offer because she enjoys being a Star Sapphire and she believes that it's a little too soon in their relationship to be accepting rings.  So the ring flies off to find it's bearer and Kyle and Carol finish off this series by saving the day, creating a new status quo for the White Lantern and going home.

That's it for this issue and the New Guardians series and man am I sad that the ride is over.  Kyle Rayner is my favorite Lantern and knowing that he isn't going to be around in June really puts a damper on the summer for me.  As for this issue though, I really enjoyed how Justin Jordan finished off this series and left something open for DC to explore in the future.  As you've come to expect, the art in this book is superb and really everything about this issue was great.  Hell, it even managed to leave us knowing that the awful future of Futures End has been rewritten and I'm all for that.  Just an incredible finale to this series and I hope everyone picks it up to finish their Kyle Rayner adventure.

Bits and Pieces:

Justin Jordan has certainly brought it for this finale to New Guardians and by "it" I mean awesomeness.  It's got callbacks, callforwards and even manages to open up the entire White Lantern status quo while delivering a satisfying ending.  While I'm disappointed to see this series go, I'm happy with the way it went and I'm happy that I was able to take this New Guardians ride.  Check it out and get your last White Lantern adventure because who knows when we'll get another.

8.8/10