It’s over. The Blackest Night has come to a conclusion. Therefore, it is important that we go over all the elements of this story just so we have proper preparation before going into The Brightest Day.
The story of the Blackest Night, besides having had to contend early on with comments by Alan Moore about how they were just “rehashing” his old work, has received a lot of feedback that has been both positive and negative. The ending, which we’ll get to in a little bit, was pretty much predicted by the majority of readers, and some have commented that all the story is doing is serving as another reboot to things. I don’t necessarily feel the same. There’s a lot to cover, so let’s get going. Spoilers ahoy.
Okay, so we begin the story with the Black Hand, a longtime Green Lantern villain, though never really much of a threat. However, he apparently has a huge plan stemming from the fact that we have all sorts of different lanterns spun from the emotional spectrum. Red is rage, orange is avarice, yellow is fear, green is willpower, blue is hope, indigo is compassion, and violet is love. However, Black Hand has a connection to the element of death, powered by the Black Power Battery from Sector-666 (yes, I know). Nekron is the leader of the Black Lantern Corps, and seemingly millions of black rings have been released.
For much of the series, we see what happens on Earth, where we learn that it is Earth, rather than Oa, that was the first planet to have life (which doesn’t make all that much sense to me, but whatever). Many deceased heroes and villains, like Aquaman, Martian Manhunter, Elongated Man, Dr. Light, Firestorm, etc. are brought back as seemingly unstoppable zombies. Because of this, heroes and villains are forced to fight their old allies, enemies, friends, and family. But that’s okay, because according to the Blue Lanterns, “All will be well.”
The more Black Lanterns show up, the more the ROYGBIV Lanterns must come together to stop them. This doesn’t go well at first, because Sinestro hates Hal Jordan, and Atrocitus hates Larfleeze, and Saint Walker hopes that everyone will eventually stop fighting and work together. They eventually learn that using their powers together creates white light, which is necessary to sever the ties of the Black Lantern rings from their hosts. This is something some of the Earth heroes learned as well, such as when Dove manages to use her power of peace to put down some former Titans.
When it seems like the good guys are getting the upper hand, the corpse of “Batman” (which, by the way, Black Hand has been lugging around since the beginning) is turned into a Black Lantern, and there’s a sudden realization that Death has touched a number of presently living heroes, like Superman, Wonder Woman, and the Green Arrow. Therefore, black rings hook onto them and turn them into Black Lanterns. So things get a bit more difficult with Black Lantern Superman helping to give everyone all kinds of hell.
It makes things incredibly difficult for The Flash and Hal Jordan, who were both recently dead. Luckily, Hal can fight off the black rings as long as he does, and The Flash is just way too fast to get caught. Together they come to the other Lanterns along with the Guardians of Oa, who realize that they will need more help on Earth while the majority of the multiple Corps members are in space fighting deceased Green Lanterns. Much like in old school Green Lantern, the idea of deputizing someone from each of the main Corps becomes the best plan they have while figuring out what is to be done about the Black Lanterns. So it plays out like this: One Guardian becomes a Green Lantern, The Flash becomes a Blue Lantern, Scarecrow becomes Yellow, Lex Luthor Orange, Wonder Woman Violet (breaking her connection to death), The Atom Indigo, Aquaman’s wife Mera Red.
All will be well. They work together, Lex goes a little nutty (as he is one to do) and Larfleeze needs to put him in his place. After much fighting with dead people and Nekron’s evil, we finally come to a point where we see the white light. The power of life is finally there for the taking of what appears to be anyone. And I do mean anyone, because Sinestro charges headfirst into the light and becomes the White Lantern. For like, two minutes. After failing to realize that Nekron is death, and cannot be destroyed by just destroying him, he loses the power because no one can manage it for themselves. However, we then manage to see Hal take charge and save the heroes who were turned into Black Lanterns while already alive. Hal, along with Superman, Wonder Woman, Kid Flash, and a few other heroes become the White Lantern Corps, and they realize there’s only one way to stop Nekron: shut the door through which he walked, meaning the Black Hand. Together, the White Lanterns use their power to bring him back to life, thereby giving the force of death nothing to cling to. The Black Lantern Power Battery is destroyed, reviving and releasing the Anti-Monitor. They send Anti-Monitor back, and the rest is clean up.
In the defeat of Nekron and the Black Lanterns, we see a few people revived. Aquaman, Martian Manhunter, Hawkman, Hawkgirl, Osiris, Maxwell Lord, Professor Zoom, Captain Boomerang, Firestorm, Jade, and Deadman. Max takes off, because he’s evil. Mera needs to be saved because to become a Red Lantern her heart must stop. Everyone mourns that Ralph and Sue Dibny are still dead. Larfleeze, oddly enough, hands Lex over to the others, meaning for the first time in his life he has given something to someone else. By the end of it we see Green Lantern and Flash together, realizing that the Batman they saw wasn’t the real one, so Red Robin was right: Bruce Wayne is alive.
Now, for the most important part: Boston Brand, now formerly Deadman. A big deal was made about Deadman in the side-issues of Blackest Night. Mainly that the Black Lanterns wanted to head to Nanda Parbat, Deadman’s source of spiritual wisdom and apparently a hotbed for the power of life. The Phantom Stranger tells Deadman that he must be reunited with his body by the time all is said and done. It seems to go against things when you understand that Deadman’s power is in that he is a ghost. But if you look at the panel in issue eight wherein he removes his white mask, he is shown to be the only remaining character to have a White Lantern ring. This, along with the ending of there being a White Power Battery having crash landed on a random stretch of road, seems to imply that there will still be a White Lantern after all this, and his name is Boston Brand.
I’m pretty happy with the ending. I mean, we’ll be free to see how things turn out now that we have these restored heroes and villains. The only problem is that by the end they comment on how now “dead means dead” implying that we may not be seeing as many revivals as we used to. If the Teen Titans keep dying at the rate they do, we’ll be very low on young heroes. Anyway, Brightest Day starts up soon, and with that we’ll be able to see how the revived are adjusting, and how life could get better for some. I just want to see more Larfleeze. That sleazy orange bastard makes me laugh.
