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A review by nikshelby
Blackest Night by Geoff Johns
4.0
>>>before this review...read mine for Blackest Night: Green Lantern....
Okay. Confession: I misunderstood the order of the graphic novels and read BN:GL first. Wrong! Don't do that! Like any series, reading it out of order messes it all up.
I read all the preludes and buildups first. And while I appreciated the grand setup for the large event coming...i've got to show my crankiness. Specific subtleties aside: every one had the same basic plot = new color in the spectrum revealed, Hal Jordan comes in contact, of course he is taken over by the new color, back to green. Every. Single. Time. Except for the Star Sapphires, they are all women. hmm...oh yes! Long time staccacto-girlfriend: Carol Ferris.
One more bit of crankiness: I stand by my opinion that these graphic novels needed a better editor. Like I said, I read these two out of order. However, there was several times that if I hadn't read the GL one first, I wouldn't have understood parts of Blackest Night. The scope of this story was the entire DC Universe. Every character was involved. Old and new. I may not understand the difficulties of putting together a cohesive main story...still, I can claim it should be better. Its so easy to be a sideline critic!
Complaints over. On to compliments.
There is no way that I could include every amazing aspect here...that would take a page-by-page "look at this!". and, I'm not kidding. You open it. That page is amazing. Turn. Amazing. Turn. Amazing. And, that's just the art! Anyone who claims that comic-art isn't REAL art...has never read one, and definitely has not looked at this one. The detail, textures, color, full-spreads, small-panels...every single penstroke and paintcolor was beautiful (even the black lanterns). I've seem some comics where the artist was good...but, the characters each had a similar feel. The women looked the same, in different outfits. The men all had the same face. Not here. Every single character was their own character - with very individual looks, costumes, mannerisms, implied movements. It was truly amazing. The black lantern designed-look of each was so cool. There were so many that I would proudly use as art on our walls. I can not express enough how impressive the art in this series was.
Now, the danger with this kind of story was that it could easily have devolved into a facile zombie/slasher/b-movie-esque type tale. That danger wasn't realized. Johns wrote a brilliant, interesting, emotional epic. Even if the art wasn't fantastic, if the story was superficial, this would've failed. It didn't though. It was carefully crafted, emotionally-involving, detail-oriented, GL-mythology-involving, expansive story. The larger view was enthralling, but, it was the characters who kept my addicted. I've said it before, and it bears repeating: some of the best modern writing is found in comic books. (I am TRYing to describe how great it was, without giving anything away!). And, I have to say, FLASH IS SO COOL. He stole the spotlight in every single scene. I jammed through this so fast, I couldn't get enough. Now, I need to read it again - taking my time to enjoy the myriad of details.
One more thing. As dark as this tale got, it was laced with lighter details: i'll just say "zombie sharks".
GJ Hal Jordan: "A poet once said "carpe diem quam minimum credula postero", which meant, "seize the day, trusting as little as possible in the future." Most people only know the first part -- "carpe diem" -- probably because not trusting tomorrow is too damn cynical. It is to me, anyway. Sure you can't rely on tomorrow, we're not guaranteed we'll have it -- but we can't be afraid of it either."
Black Hand: "Why? Life was an accident. It has no meaning. It has no purpose."
Flash Barry Allen: "LIFE doesn't give US purpose, Black Hand. WE give LIFE purpose...I don't know why the earth or sky or people exist. And the fact is, i'll probably never know...We are the ones that give life purpose...We all live for different reasons, Hal. It's up to us to figure those out."
Okay. Confession: I misunderstood the order of the graphic novels and read BN:GL first. Wrong! Don't do that! Like any series, reading it out of order messes it all up.
I read all the preludes and buildups first. And while I appreciated the grand setup for the large event coming...i've got to show my crankiness. Specific subtleties aside: every one had the same basic plot = new color in the spectrum revealed, Hal Jordan comes in contact, of course he is taken over by the new color, back to green. Every. Single. Time. Except for the Star Sapphires, they are all women. hmm...oh yes! Long time staccacto-girlfriend: Carol Ferris.
One more bit of crankiness: I stand by my opinion that these graphic novels needed a better editor. Like I said, I read these two out of order. However, there was several times that if I hadn't read the GL one first, I wouldn't have understood parts of Blackest Night. The scope of this story was the entire DC Universe. Every character was involved. Old and new. I may not understand the difficulties of putting together a cohesive main story...still, I can claim it should be better. Its so easy to be a sideline critic!
Complaints over. On to compliments.
There is no way that I could include every amazing aspect here...that would take a page-by-page "look at this!". and, I'm not kidding. You open it. That page is amazing. Turn. Amazing. Turn. Amazing. And, that's just the art! Anyone who claims that comic-art isn't REAL art...has never read one, and definitely has not looked at this one. The detail, textures, color, full-spreads, small-panels...every single penstroke and paintcolor was beautiful (even the black lanterns). I've seem some comics where the artist was good...but, the characters each had a similar feel. The women looked the same, in different outfits. The men all had the same face. Not here. Every single character was their own character - with very individual looks, costumes, mannerisms, implied movements. It was truly amazing. The black lantern designed-look of each was so cool. There were so many that I would proudly use as art on our walls. I can not express enough how impressive the art in this series was.
Now, the danger with this kind of story was that it could easily have devolved into a facile zombie/slasher/b-movie-esque type tale. That danger wasn't realized. Johns wrote a brilliant, interesting, emotional epic. Even if the art wasn't fantastic, if the story was superficial, this would've failed. It didn't though. It was carefully crafted, emotionally-involving, detail-oriented, GL-mythology-involving, expansive story. The larger view was enthralling, but, it was the characters who kept my addicted. I've said it before, and it bears repeating: some of the best modern writing is found in comic books. (I am TRYing to describe how great it was, without giving anything away!). And, I have to say, FLASH IS SO COOL. He stole the spotlight in every single scene. I jammed through this so fast, I couldn't get enough. Now, I need to read it again - taking my time to enjoy the myriad of details.
One more thing. As dark as this tale got, it was laced with lighter details: i'll just say "zombie sharks".
GJ Hal Jordan: "A poet once said "carpe diem quam minimum credula postero", which meant, "seize the day, trusting as little as possible in the future." Most people only know the first part -- "carpe diem" -- probably because not trusting tomorrow is too damn cynical. It is to me, anyway. Sure you can't rely on tomorrow, we're not guaranteed we'll have it -- but we can't be afraid of it either."
Black Hand: "Why? Life was an accident. It has no meaning. It has no purpose."
Flash Barry Allen: "LIFE doesn't give US purpose, Black Hand. WE give LIFE purpose...I don't know why the earth or sky or people exist. And the fact is, i'll probably never know...We are the ones that give life purpose...We all live for different reasons, Hal. It's up to us to figure those out."