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  Movie Maniacs rating:
  GLStars
  Rating: 12A
  Release Date: 17/06/2011  
 

Genre:

Science-Fiction, Fantasy, Action Adventure

 

 
   

By Ryan Casey

 

Yet another movie adaptation from DC Comics. The trailers took us from expecting a Ryan Reynolds comedy to then a more serious science fiction flick, but in the end it was just plain crap. Green Lantern has an alright cast, apart from Ryan Reynolds. It stars Mark Strong with voice appearances from Michael Clarke Duncan and Geoffrey Rush. However, just like Spiderman 3, Kick-Ass, Fantastic Four, I’d managed to get myself all excited for Green Lantern to start thinking it might actually be good. More fool me!

 

PLOT SYNOPSIS

So the story goes that there is an intergalactic peace force called the Green Lantern Corp. They were created at some point in history by the Immortal Guardians of the Universe (little blue Yoda people) who managed to harness the power of the green light, which is powered by the emotion of willpower. They forged green power rings that were distributed to every sector of space to a selected few worthy beings. Somewhere along the lines one of the Guardians named Parallax, went rogue in an attempt to harness the yellow power of fear. Ok so that's a brief intro to the history, but the opening sequence is actually quite interesting and one of the most engaging parts of the movie are the scenes not set on Earth, despite some dodgy CGI.

 

Hal Jordan is a fearless test pilot for the US military, whose life is profiled as a mixture of casual sex and thrill seeking. Combined with a rebellious/carefree attitude towards authority, you’d expect to like this guy. However, he is portrayed by a shallow Ryan Reynolds and you find this air force hot shot more frustrating than likable. Hal finds himself in front of a crashed space ship with a pink alien dying in the cockpit (Abin Sur a Green Lantern). Abin Sur is gravely injured from a recent fight with Parallax. His ring has chosen Hal Jordan as a replacement, but seriously there's over six billion people on the planet and this guy gets chosen?


While Parallax casually floats around the galaxy scaring people, we fall victim to the tedious romantic sub plot between Hal Jordan and Carol Ferris (Blake Lively). Meanwhile, scientist failure Hector Hammond's (Peter Sarsgaard) Dad (Tim Robbins) gains him access to perform an autopsy on Abin Sur. He is infected by a small piece of Parallax that remained in Abin Sur's dead body and this inadvertently gives Hector psychic powers and a fat f**k off head.

 

RyanRants

You can sum up Green Lantern with one word – Boring. The movie has this irritating tendency to build up your excitement with a decent slice of action, only to extinguish your brief enthusiasm with a tedious ‘will they or won't they’ love scene between Hal Jordan and Carol Ferris.

 

The most annoying and frustrating section of the movie has got to be the final battle, because just at the moment Sinestro is about convince the Guardians to use the power of fear in the form of a newly forged yellow ring (would have been a much better ending), Hal Jordan shows up asking for the chance to save his planet from Parallax. Now seeing as Parallax has so effortlessly disposed of Green Lanterns earlier in the movie you'd think the Corp would send everyone they've got, or at least the ones with the famous acting voices. However, this is not the case and the Guardians seem completely content with sending the newbie to go and fight off the most dangerous creature in the universe.

 

That's not the worst of it! With some awful trickery in which he fools Parallax into falling into the Sun, Sinestro, Killowog (Michael Clarke Duncan) and Tomar-Re (Geoffrey Rush) show up just in time to save an exhausted Hal Jordan from falling in himself. Why on earth did they not show up ten minutes earlier and help? "Nah it's alright lads, let's just finish this cup of tea then we'll show our faces."

 

There are so many stupid things about the movie but in all honesty I just find the whole thing too boring to even go in to detail about it. Yet again I am disappointed by the comic book movie genre. Is there something wrong with expecting more when it comes to the on screen adaptations of my favourite childhood heroes?

 

I had to use up every last ounce of willpower to get through this tedious ball ache of a movie. 1.5 stars out of 5.

 

 

 

 

 

       
       

 

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