Thought I would share with you all a great example of nerd rage. I was reading on IMdb about the upcoming Green Lantern Movie. A bunch of fans were talking about CGI looking a bit ropey (and to be fair the shots they showed did look really ropey) there was some passioned if blinkered defence from the Pro GL crew. Then someone suggested that the Green Lantern was a second teir superhero as opposed to Superman, Hulk, Spiderman et al. and the nerd rage was ignited.

It was a joy to read.

It got me to thinking about GL and why there is almost no exposure of him outside comic fans and over here (UK) he is really 3rd or 4th tier.

From popularity amongst the non-initiated my take woudl be that these guys were the 'top tier' Comic superheroes, being the ones that everyone has heard of (I don't include -

Superman, Spiderman, the Hulk, Wonder Woman & Batman of whom Batman is the current top of the heap and Wonder Woman really a bit of a joke and an excuse for girls to wear costumes to parties.

Then there is second tier that generally young movie watching folks know about X-Men (well really they only know Wolverine and are vaguely aware of the rest), Captain America, Iron Man, Catwoman, The Joker, The Fantastic Four.

Then there are the third tier guys like Daredevil, The Punisher and all the folks that have been part of crappy films that never quite made it and cartoons like The Tick

Then you have the ones that really no one that doesn't read comics have heard of and The Green Lantern falls down here for me.

Is that a cultural thing? Does DC just promote the Green Lantern in the US?

Honestly there's little coverage of GL outside of comics here too.  John Stewart is in the Justice League cartoons, and of course there was a terrible version of Hal Jordan in the old Superfriends cartoon.  There's apparently a new full series dedicated to Hal Jordan as GL coming later this year, so maybe that'll give him some more front and center coverage.

Mostly though, he just never got the mainstream coverage Batman and Superman have.  Maybe it's a failure of character, or the concept wasn't interesting, I dunno.  The fact that he doesn't have quite the contiguous history the other two do probably doesn't help.  There's a pretty big gap between the golden age Alan Scott GL, and the revamped and rewritten Hal Jordan of the 60s.

Green Lantern is  an awesome character. But he is a hard sell, since the old version had the weakness of "yellow". Many people just can't take that seriously.

Quote from: danbuter;452204Green Lantern is  an awesome character. But he is a hard sell, since the old version had the weakness of "yellow". Many people just can't take that seriously.

Is that it or is the whole concept a bit crap ? The Yellow bit is particualrly funny though

In Kingdom Come, which is a great comic, Batman, Superman and Wonderwoman get centre stage. The Flash is portrayed as too otherworldly and The Green Lantern despite getting a few covers and some great Alex Ross art .... I don't think gets to say a line for the entire book.

I like GL's scope; dude is a Space Policeman with a power to whip up anything he can dream up (as well as fly, etc., etc.).

I just generally like the "cosmic," sort of level the whole Lantern Corps had to work on moreso than mere Earth based / one-city-focused superheroes.  Just seemed sexier to me.

...and then there is this take on 'im:
http://www.cracked.com/blog/green-lantern-star-pervert-comic/