Everything’s gone green (lantern)

With a third Batman film only just starting production and a new Superman movie on the horizon, Warner Bros. big hope at competing with Marvel’s Avengers films is the Green Lantern. Based on the 1960’s comic book by John Broome and Gil Kane, the film will follow the transformation of fearless test pilot Hal Jordan into the most successful member of a galactic police force known as the Green Lantern Corps. If this one works, expect two more Green Lantern films, a Flash movie and more (much like Marvel building on Iron Man’s success with Thor and Captain America).

So far there has been very little revealed aside from still images of alien design, the basic plot outline and hi-res images showing Ryan Reynolds (Hal Jordan) and Blake Lively (Carol Ferris) looking moodily romantic.

Today, the official trailer hit the web…

It looks pretty much like I expected it to, hard core Hollywood rock soundtrack, unlikely ‘dude’ gets magic ring and big explosive special effects. The effects looks impressive and Peter Sarsgaard as Hector Hammond (the weird looking guy with the mustache in the trailer) looks scary. But in the trailer Reynolds is playing Jordan just as I feared he would, a slacker regular joe who is overwhelmed at the power he has been granted. They even included the ‘best friend’ who is along for the ride to pop out his eyes and remind us that Hal Jordan is the unlikeliest of heroes ever.

I want to like this movie, but so far it looks like it’s shooting far too low. A Green Lantern film has massive potential, it doesn’t need to look similar to other lousy comic book movie trailers like… Green Hornet. Both feature an irresponsible dude who finds himself thrust into the position of superhero. But to be fair, this is essentially the same pitch as the Iron Man trailer, so the concept of an irresponsible guy turning over a new leaf to become a superhero may not be the problem.

I think closer to the point is that this isn’t Hal Jordan’s story, it’s Kyle Rayner. Jordan is a super cool hard as nails jet jockey who misses his father and yearns for something he can never have deep deep deep down. Even his best friend Oliver Queen would have to share a good portion of Jack Daniels with Jordan to get that deep. On the surface, Jordan is as hard as they come. Rayner, on the other hand, is more emotional, impulsive and juvenile (much like Reynolds’ portrayal of Jordan in the trailer). Rayner’s journey is one of proving himself to be worthy while Jordan knew that he was the best Green Lantern all along.

Let me reiterate that I want to like this movie and parts of the trailer are just amazing. But I’m very disappointed in the depiction of Hal Jordan as it justifies every bad feeling I had when Reynolds was announced as the lead.