Green Lantern Review

Overall Rating: C

Spoilers will come later.

Just got back from seeing Green Lantern, and I didn't hate it. So that's something. Since this movie has been getting horrible reviews, and has 24% on rotten tomatoes I went in with pretty low expectations. That is how I suggest you go into this movie. I'll get more specific later, but it's not the best. It's not a bad movie at all, but it's really nothing more than a popcorn movie. While the action is great and the special effects are used quite well, the writing and acting are both very poor. The jokes were poor as well. While Green Lantern is not a silly comic at all, Ryan Reynolds still is behaving the way he always does. His dry sarcastic delivery of some of the jokes worked at times, but more often it did not. The story is pretty good. They ease you into the world with an expository voice over combined with very nice visuals that both explains everything to you, and reminds you that this is only a comic book.  More on the story later in the spoiler section.

Green Lantern is a DC comic classic, and this is their only movie in the year of the Marvel comic book movies. The comic book is very popular and has been for many decades, so they had a lot to work with here. The cast did an okay job, some much stronger than others. As I said above, the action was the true winner in this movie. I was very pleased how the Green Lantern effects were visualized in the movie, and even though large amounts of CGI were needed I thought they were seamlessly integrated into the real life surroundings. I saw the movie in 3D and had serious issues with that aspect. I felt it added nothing to the movie, and in various scenes it seemed incomplete, or problematic.

Read on for more, and Spoilers



Ryan Reynolds did a good job as the hero of the movie; Hal Jordan. He's a talented test pilot who doesn't follow the rules and has serious daddy death issues. They do a good job throughout the movie of explaining that the Green Rings draw their power from WILL, or will power. The ability to rise above struggle, and show true courage. There also is the yellow power of fear. This is personified in the former Guardian known as Parallax. Parallax is a creature of pure fear that goes around devouring the fear people feel, causing it to grow stronger. I thought more time should have been spent on this threat, and the true power he had. We hear that he's destroying worlds, and on his way to the Green Lantern planet, but they seem calm about it. Perhaps this was to show that the Green Lanterns don't have fear, but as we all know there is a difference between not being afraid, and being apathetic. Reminded me almost of the Jedi Council in the Star Wars prequels.

Blake Lively as Hal's lady friend didn't do much for me. I didn't think any of her scenes were very well written, and her behavior seemed more relegated to a Saturday morning cartoon rather than a full live action movie.  I assume she loves Hal, but all she does is fight(flirt) with him in totally obvious ways.  This behavior makes baddie Hector Hammond(the GREAT Peter Sarsgaard) very unhappy. He was good in the movie. I love him in general so there was very little chance I would not like him in this role. He gives off that "pathetic scientist turned pissed off super human" vibe VERY well, and it does seem like a natural progression. I liked that his evil climatic solution was to inject Blake Lively with the same substance, not so she would like him, but so she would no longer like Hal, and vice versa.  That my friends is what happens when jocks push the nerds around to much.

The brilliance of Mark Strong as future SUPER BADDIE Sinestro is clear from the beginning. I believe that Mark Strong should play every villain in every movie. He's so great at looking creepy as hell, but so charming that it scares me. I won't lie that the entire movie I was waiting for that scene after the credits where he puts on the yellow ring to truly turn into the Sinestro we all know. This movie might not have been great, but Green Lantern 2, with Sinestro as the bad guy will be EPIC. He's one of the best villains in comic book history.  I also loved random Tim Robbins as the Senator. He's just great in general.

Ok, the story. Like I said above, I thought the story was what it needed to be, and more. After all this movie was not about the battle with Hammond, nor with Parallax. It was an origin story for both Hal Jordan, and Sinestro. While it was no where near as good, it's almost like how Batman Begins is the origin story leading into The Dark Knight. This was an origin story leading in to the sequel. The way Hal Jordan defeats Parallax is very cool, and a nice call back to what I thought was the most random moment of the movie. The phrase "The bigger they are, the faster they burn" bothers me a great deal since it's you know, BS, but that's okay. If that was my biggest gripe with the movie, then I'd nominate it for an Oscar.

I mentioned above about the 3D. Unless you love 3D, don't see it like that. It might have just been me, but there were several moments where while wearing the glasses it still looked the way it does with them off. My eyes are not perfect, but that had never happened before. This issue was very distracting to me, especially in the larger scenes where we see mostly CGI environments. I don't think the 3D added anything special, and the issues I had took away from the the scenes with the most 3D, and special effects.  I'm not a fan of 3D in general, so I'm sure that influenced me too.

The scenes that bothered me the most were the emotional exchanges between Ryan Reynolds and Blake Lively. It's not really their fault because I think it was more of a writing mistake. It seemed like it was written for 10 year-olds. Maybe they were worried about getting a higher rating, but I assume these two had slept together and they acted like holding hands would be a HUGE step. These scenes also had near to no chemistry. That I can blame on the two actors. At no point did I feel like they liked each other for any reason other than she's the only woman he knows(other than the woman he was sleeping with in the beginning which might have been the same woman, but that would make absolutely no sense since she got on him for being late, and he left while that woman was still sleeping). I honestly feel like they spent so much time on the action scenes they just didn't care about the other scenes. This became more distracting when they kept going back and forth. The flow of the movie in terms of action and slow emotion was off.  The slower scenes took me out of the moment, and removed me from the looming danger.

With that said, I did like the scene where he appears at her window Superman style and expects her to not know it's him, but almost immediately she figures it out since he's only wearing a small green mask. I thought that was a nice joke about the whole idea of secret identities that fool even the hero's closest friends.

The last thing I'll say is that DC would be happy to know that I do plan to read the Green Lantern comic when it is rebooted in September. At least for a while. I liked the Universe a lot, and sense there a many stories to tell.

Anyway, that's all I really have to say about the movie. The podcast will be recording on Monday night at 9:00 ET. Send in your thoughts on Super 8, and Green Lantern to the voice mail line if you so desire. That number is (973)LFB-CAST. We also will be discussing the GREAT movie Raiders of the Lost Ark since it's the 30th anniversary. Or was last week. So send in your thoughts on that too. Over the next few days I'll be posting my reviews of the new TNT show Falling Skies, and The Killing season finale. Since they air at the same time, The Killing review may be delayed until Monday, but we shall see. Check late Sunday night.

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