Green Lanterns #5 Review and *SPOILERS*

Push It To The Limit

Written By: Sam Humphries
Art By: Robson Rocha, Eduardo Pansica, Jay Leisten, Julio Ferreira, Blond, Dave Sharpe

Cover Price: $2.99

Release Date: August 17, 2016

*Non Spoilers and Score At The Bottom*

Something has to be done about this series.  Not only are we continuing to hear the same things out of Simon and Jessica, but we're now also getting Red Lanterns showing up, who died in the Red Lanterns series........ which if you didn't read, you totally should because it was awesome!....... Well, at least Charles Soule's run on the book.  Anyway, there just isn't much to this book and that pisses me off because this was the title that I wanted to read more than any other when Rebirth was announced and it's constantly smacking me in the face, while reminding me how whiny our heroes are.......... Hopefully all that changes now that Simon and Jessica are face to face with their Red Lantern foes and are forced to take a little action.  Let's jump into this issue and see if they can start taking care of business and start working their way back into our hearts.  Let's check it out.

Explain It!:

First off, let me get this out of the way and just tell you that we don't get any explanations about why Zilius Zox or Skallox are alive or why they're working for Atrocitus........ nothing.  They're just there as fan favorite Red Lanterns who were probably picked because they're classic characters at this stage, who Sam Humphries probably just happened to see from when Geoff Johns created the rest of the emotional spectrum...... and while it won't matter to any new readers jumping into this........ or readers who didn't happen to have the Red Lanterns title on their pull list, it matters to anyone who read and loved that title because Zilius and Skallox's deaths were beautiful in that we had a complete turn around in their characters, where we actually saw them become heroes........ and really, just likable characters, which was hard to come by for a long time when it came to Rage Lanterns.  So with that out of the way, let's look at the rest of the book with ignorant eyes......... The first half is just nonsense.

We've got our two heroes standing in the way of the Red Lanterns and their plans of conquering the world........ or whatever it is they're trying to do by placing the Rage Seed inside the Hell Tower and for the most part it's pretty standard fare for what we've gotten from this series.  Simon doesn't like being racially profiled and Jessica has anxiety, but I will give this first half of this issue one thing, they do try to make this inner dialog a little more playful than usual, with Simon talking about how he loves his truck and how Jessica loves herself some Pokemon Go.......... Yeah, it's not much, but it's something a little different than what we've gotten in the past and when it comes to this title, I'm always looking for a little more or even something a little different.

Eventually though, we get this book actually showing me something that makes sense for everything that we've seen of these characters and that's them being totally in over their head with saving the world from these monsters.  Simon gets the idea from curing Bleez and Jessica of her rage in the past that he can do the same to Atrocitus and end this whole thing from the source........ and it's great because while he goes off to go do that, he tells Jessica to take on the rest of the Red Lanterns by herself and while initially it looks like she was going to step up and actually get shit done, the character we've all come to know and expect comes out and our hero runs from the fight, crying and cowering.  Which may not be fun for anyone reading, but I appreciate it because for the majority of this issue Jessica was talking smack left and right and it was just nice to see that her character didn't completely change between issues.  So yeah, bad times for Jessica, but you tell me who has it worse because Simon, all cock sure goes up to Atrocitus and tries to throw his healing whammy on him, but instead the Lord of the Red looks like he breaks Simon's goddamn arm........... Yeah, it doesn't look like there's anyone left to stop the Red Lanterns from doing whatever the hell they want with the Earth....... and I hope that Simon learns from this and doesn't jump to wild conclusions about what he can and cannot do........... even though this series kind of makes it look like he can do everything.

That's it for this issue of Green Lanterns and like most of the other issues we've gotten from this series, this was just more fluff and nonsense just to get us to the end of the book, but the one thing that I really appreciated was the end of the issue, where Jessica and Simon got their asses handed to them because it made sense.  I would have been pissed if our heroes were able to take on the Red Lanterns out of nowhere here because it would have been a cop out from everything we've seen so far.  It just felt right because whether Simon wants to admit it or not, they're really not ready for this kind of threat, so even if you're like me and finding the constant inner monologues from these character a bit tedious since it's forced in every issue, at least it's staying consistent and making sense on that front.............. because it certainly isn't by adding the Red Lanterns in here......... but I'm not going to get into that again.  So yeah, while not a lot went down in my mind until the end of the issue, with the excellent art all the way through this wasn't a terrible issue to read....... it's just like the rest though in that you expect more from it.  

Bits and Pieces:

While you won't be getting a lot of progression in the story from this issue, what you will get is excellent art that kicks ass from the beginning to the end and characters that feel right for everything we've gotten so far.  It's just a shame that the Zilius and Skallox are forced in because they have little to nothing to do except for being ugly and menacing.  

6.5/10