Green Lantern Corps: Edge of Oblivion #5 Review and *SPOILERS*

Guy Gardner: Annoying Warrior

Written By: Tom Taylor

Art By: Scott McDaniel, Ardian Syaf, Cliff Richards, Jonathan Glapion, Mark Irwin, Blond, Dave Sharpe

Cover Price: $2.99

Release Date: May 11, 2016

*Non Spoilers and Score At The Bottom*

Now, I'm not going to lie to you.  I haven't been the biggest fan of this mini series and the thing that hurts the most is that I really wanted to be all about it.  I thought Cullen Bunn writing Lost Army was going to this epic tale that would blow me away and when that didn't happen and I heard that the series would have a continuation brought to us by Tom Taylor......... Well, I thought that would blow me away too.  Sadly, that hasn't happened yet and there's little to no cohesion between this series and Lost Army, which is a shame because I'm one of those continuity fanboys that just lives for shit like that.  Anyway, we still have this issue and the last to get our wigs blown back and since I read this issue before writing this opener, even though I like to make you think I haven't, I'll take those odds.  Let's jump into this issue, so we can find out what happens now that a handful of our Lanterns know the truth about the Last City's gigantic protectors actually being the devourers of this Universe.  Let's check it out.

Explain It!:

Our issue begins with a little flashback about Guy Gardner's home life as a child and just in case you don't know Guy that well, it's also about Guy Gardner's personality as well.  We see Guy taking a beating from his father and egging his old man on to give him some more as a way to prove that he can take it and also so that all of his father's frustrations are focused on him and not on the rest of his family.  While this moment is really brief, it underlines what the rest of the story will be about in that Guy is willing to annoy his father to point of self endangerment as long as he can protect others.  It's really great and that's not where the great ends either.  After our brief flashback we see that Xrill-Vrek has used her empathy powers in order to get Guy's head right from Ausras' mind control that we saw him suffering at the end of the last issue and once Guy gets his head wrapped around everything he's done in order to appease a gigantic Cthulhu.......... well, he's obviously pissed and it's glorious.  

So our band of Lanterns decide that they have to go after Dismas and Ausras even though the ten other Lanterns on the Last City are under their control (since the rest of the Lanterns are out and about, looking for an exit from this Universe) and they realize that even with them being out numbered, all they have to do is get Xrill-Vrek to get one of them thinking straight to win the day.  Now, I'm going to spoil this right away because apparently I'm a big dummy.  Here I was thinking, "Oh yeah, they'll just get John Stewart on their side and the rest will be gravy".  As it turns out though, while our band of Lanterns fought the brainwashed Lanterns and Guy single handedly took on Ausras and Dismas as a way to keep them annoyed and occupied, Xrill-Vrek was unlocking the mind of Mogo, to send a blast of Green Lantern energy up these giants' asses that they'll never forget..... This makes so much sense........ like I said, big dummy.  

In the end, Iolande showed up with her group of Lanterns to try and talk some sense into her warring fellow Corpsmen, before Mogo went and zapped the shit out of the gigantic gluttons and as we close out this issue we finally get to see these monsters for what they are........... pretty much Cthulhu monster men and with this transformation, the rest of the Lanterns snap out of their spell and realize that they were rooting for the wrong team........... and hopefully it pisses them off as much as it did Guy.

That's it for this issue of Edge of Oblivion and I gotta tell you, after having a bunch of issues that I wasn't really into, this is a breath of fresh air, that not only puts the story exactly where it needs to be, but also portrays our Lanterns exactly how you'd want them to be.......... brainwashed or not.  From this issue alone you can tell how much Tom Taylor loves Guy Gardner and even though we've spent this series by the character's side and really spotlighting him, this issue does it better than we've seen it before since our Lanterns found themselves lost in a Universe that was not their own.  Just a great issue that left me happy as hell by the time it was over and that goes hand in hand with the excellent art in this issue as well.  The entire creative team were firing on all cylinders here and I really hope that this feel continues for the final issue.

Bits and Pieces:

Edge of Oblivion came out of nowhere this week and blew me away with how great all of our Lanterns feel in this issue.  We've got drama, comedy and sci fi action adventure all thrown at us here and it's fantastic in all its elements, especially the portrayal of Guy Gardner.  With an excellent story and art that looks great throughout the issue, this is the Edge of Oblivion that you've been waiting for.

9/10