Comic Review – “Green Lantern: Ganthet’s Tale”

My favourite author wrote a graphic novel. It took me a while to track it down, but eBay had the goods.

General Information

Title: Green Lantern: Ganthet’s Tale
Credited to: Larry Niven, John Byrne, and Matt Webb
Original Publication Date: This was a 1992 reprint, without the
original copyright date. I believe that was 1971, but I could be wrong.
ISBN: 1-56389-026-7
Cover Price: $5.95 US, $6.95 Can
Buy from: Amazon.com
or Amazon.ca

Premise

A Guardian named Ganthet visits Hal Jordan and tells him a story about
the true history of the Universe.

High Point

Running away (at about 9% of the speed of light.)

Low Point

The exposition. The problem isn’t with any particular exposition, but
there’s just so much of it in here that it gets tedious. Maybe it
would mean more to me if this weren’t my first Green Lantern title.
(Up until now, I’ve only seen him in supporting roles in larger
stories, and on the Justice League cartoon.) It seems to be
a story that redefined the nature of the title, but this was my first
introduction to both versions of this history, so it didn’t come as a
shock. They did a nice job of cramming in the major elements of the
powers and limitations of the Green Lanterns, though.

The Scores

I’m not sure if this is an original entry in the Green
Lantern canon, but I don’t remember reading a comic quite like it. I give
it 5 out of 6.

The artwork was fairly good. It got pretty green at times,
but that’s to be expected with this title. I give it 4 out of 6.

The story was well plotted, but some of the dialogue could
have been cleaned up. (Hal says “er” a lot for starters.) I give it
4 out of 6.



The characterization could have been better. I felt I knew
Ganthet and Percival to some degree, but I still don’t really have a
handle on Hal Jordan. I give it 3 out of 6.

The emotional response this produced was weak in the
expository first half. Once the necessary groundwork was laid out,
things picked up. The “running away” bit worked very well, as did the
ending. I give it 4 out of 6.

The flow was very good. There was one dialogue heavy moment
in the middle of the action, but most of the dialogue takes place with
people standing around listening, so there were few problems there. I
give it 5 out of 6.

Overall, this was entertaining, but not necessarily a good
introduction to the character. (Of course, I bought this mainly
because I’m a big Larry Niven fan, not because I wanted to be
introduced to Green Lantern.) I give it 4 out of 6.

In total, Green Lantern: Ganthet’s Tale receives 29 out of 42.