Green Lantern/Headscratchers

• Yellow? Seriously? They've sort-of explained this in the modern era, but back in the Silver Age, it was played perfectly straight. "Here's one of the most powerful artifacts in the universe. Just pray you never have to face anyone with a credit card and access to a Sherwin-Williams."
  • If that is the only thing about the Silver Age you find overly silly, you haven't been reading very much Silver Age stuff. The proper and only explanation you will ever find is "lol, that wacky silver age" and move on.
  • One of them had a weakness against wood...
    • That would be the Golden Age Green Lantern Alan Scott, who received his power via a magic lamp and is associated with the modern Green Lantern/Green Lantern Corps in name only. Also, so far as I know, he still has that weakness against wooden objects.
      • For awhile, his daughter Jade was a member of the Green Lantern Corps. She inherited her father's weakness along with his powers, and this was when yellow was still a major problem, so she had BOTH weaknesses. Ouch.
        • So, essentially, she could be defeated with a #2 pencil.
• I don't keep up with the comics, so maybe this was answered, but isn't it a bit redundant to make sure that Earth has a Green Lantern? It already has Superman, The Flash, Batman, etc. running around. You'd think they'd send a ring to Pluto or wherever instead.
  • Who's going to be committing crimes on Pluto? There's nothing there.
    • Pluto Is Expendable: It was destroyed in Our Worlds At War.
  • Earth needs all the help it can get, and so does the Green Lantern Corps.
  • Hal Jordan is the Green Lantern of all of Space Sector 2814. Earth is only one of many inhabited worlds in his jurisdiction.
  • Incredibly enough, they did a decent job of justifying why Earth has so MANY Green Lanterns protecting it (3? 4?). In Blackest Night, we learn that it houses an entity that was responsible for the creation of all life, and all emotion in the universe. It sounds a bit less insane when you're too busy thinking about how cool Scarecrow is as a member of the Sinestro Corps.
    • Of course, he spends all his time in-comic on Earth and Oa, leaving Ungara and the rest of 2814 to take care of themselves, but maybe he comes by on weekends to check on them or something.
    • Hal would be quick to point out in bewilderment that Earth gets the majority of intergalactic crime, likely not realizing that the Earth is the center of the multiverse.
• Why does Sector 2814 have so many Lanterns? Rayner, Stewart, Gardner, Jordan... isn't each sector supposed to only have one or two?
  • John Stewart became a Green Lantern after Guy Gardner was seriously injured, and Kyle Rayner became a Lantern after the Corps was pretty much wiped out. Each sector is supposed to have two Lanterns. After Hal Jordan came back and the Corps were restored, Kyle and Guy went to Oa to train new Green Lanterns, while John and Hal serve as the Lanterns of Sector 2814.
  • In modern continuity, it's because Earth is the center of the multiverse. Specifically, Earth is the "keystone" of sorts for the entire multiverse. Destroy Earth and you risk destroying all other universes that exist.
  • Plus, the Corps needed all the experienced Lanterns it could get; since all the Earth Lanterns were available and had rings again, it makes sense that they were an asset. In Green Lantern Corps: Recharge, they state they have only have 300 Lanterns trained when they need 7200 to patrol the universe; it also stated that they were getting back other experienced Lanterns too. Plus when the Spider Guild attacked the Guardians had to issue a code black to get the few Lanterns out there to help out. It's not a case of Earth getting special treatment, but because they were active, experienced and available to help get the Corps back on its feet.
  • Actually, officially, only Hal and John are the officers of Sector 2814, while Kyle and Guy are Honor Guard Lanterns who, as stated above, assist in training rookie Lanterns.
  • I think the better question is why the Sinestro Corps only has one known recruit from Earth's sector, when Sinestro organized it to be a mirror of the Green Lantern Corps. Of course, if you're asking that, you really have to wonder why a loser like Amon Sur was selected, instead of the whole hosts of supervillains on Earth, but that's another matter entirely.
    • Well, the yellow ring did try to conscript Batman and Jonathan Crane first. It's probably for the best that The Joker didn't get his hands on it.
    • Because he was Abin Sur's son. Aside from the symbolism and the fact that Abin was Sinestro's friend, Amon hated Hal pretty much more than anyone (as Amon thought he deserved his father's ring).
• If Sector 2814 gets so many Green Lanterns, why is there no Lantern for Abin Sur's planet? All of our local Lanterns seem to focus on Earth, ignoring the rest of the sector.
  • Umm... because Abin Sur died on Earth and his ring searched for the closest candidate and got Hal Jordan. Then Guy came along and went, and then there was Jon who took Guy's place. Ganthet later went to Earth since it was a desperate move to find a new Lantern that could possibly bring Parallax back to sanity (an earthling). All of the important stuff happens on/near Earth anyway. Besides Abin Sur's son tried to be the GL of the sector, but failed utterly.
    • Yeah, be that as it may, you'd think that with so many extra Lanterns, we'd post one on Abin Sur's planet or something, rather than keeping all of 2814's Lanterns on Earth and Oa.
    • Well, I don't remember Abin Sur's planet being the one that's constantly invaded. Or the one that's the center of The Multiverse. All in all, Earth needs the extra vigilance. Same with Oa being the Headquarters and most likely place to be attacked in an attempt to cripple the Corps (and yes, this had happened multiple times.)
      • It's been hand waved that Earth is the center of the multiverse or some such. I forget exact details, being a Marvel fan.
      • And of course, the real reason: because only people on Earth read "Green Lantern" comics.
    • Green Lanterns also have Faster Than Light travel with their rings (how long it takes them to get places sometimes seems to differ) so it's not unreasonable to think that they don't need to be stationed on a planet, so much as check in occasionally. If Abin Sur's planet is particularly quiet and not prone to periodic threats of total annihilation, then it actually does make more sense to keep the Lanterns stationed on Earth, which comes under attack roughly every other week.
• How do you trust a guy named SINESTRO as part of the Green Lantern Corps?
  • In universe answer: Names to Run Away From Really Fast doesn't apply to the Green Lantern Corps since as an interplanetary police force, naming conventions won't cross cultural boundaries as easily. Add to that that though the rings translate for the members, most of the Lanterns are called by their phonetic home name, so for all we know "Sinestro" is Korugarian for "Totally Trustworthy McNiceGuy". Secondly, Sinestro was the most respected and effective GL based on merit and performance. If there even was an inkling of distrust (let's say the rings translated the raw meaning of his name from Korugarian to English / Whatever as "Ima McBadguy"), then it would have been wiped away because A. as Empathic Weapons, the rings only choose good guys, and B. his years of faithful service & due diligence. I'm not even sure that with his betrayal in hindsight, you could call it inevitable based on a name.
  • Out of universe answer: You really don't, but as a friend to left handed people, I have to say that Sinestro is derived from the latin "left handed" which is only used as a synonym for evil "out of dark ages" ignorance. And yeah, Sinestro wears his ring on his left hand most adaptations I've seen him in, so his parents may well have literally named him "Lefty" on purpose. So even if I ran into someone named Sinestro in real life, I'd at least give them the benefit of the doubt.
  • These kinds of things are another one of those annoying cases where people somehow forget that the characters in the story are in the story and not snarky outside observers like us. If you found yourself partnered by your boss in Real Life at your place of business with a guy named Baron von Killshot, would you actually be afraid of the guy just because of his motherfucking name?? Would you be so timid and neurotic as to insist that they pair you with someone else? Wouldn't they be right to accuse you of being prejudiced toward the man and possibly borderline mentally ill? It's just a name, and if the man did turn out to be evil, it would just be a fluke. People in Real Life as well as in fiction generally understand that, and if they said anything at all, the likeliest reaction would be a friendly joke or pun or question about how the fellow came by the name (maybe followed by, "I'm sorry, you probably get that all the time").
    • While that's all well and good, I'm still not working with Baron von Killshot.
    • What?! Do you want to get on Baron Von Killshot's bad side?! What you want is to be on his good side when he inevitably snaps and/or tries to take over the world.
    • Anyway, it also bears mentioning that "Sinestro" is his surname (and are you really gonna judge the whole family?). His first name is the rather benign-sounding Thaal.
  • Well, they figured that since Green Lanterns Wickedania, Monsterga, and Eviltor all turned out just fine...
• Why is it that no one ever brings up the fact that Hal was possessed by Parallax, and not responsible for the deaths of the original Corps? He blames himself, I understand that, but why does no one ever bring up this distinction?
  • Well, people actually bring that up all the time - it's the entire rationale for his return to hero status. As for why some characters can't get over it, well, in some cases like the Lost Lanterns, it's just stubborn prejudice. I believe there's also an element to it that even though he wasn't in control when Parallax took over, it was his own fears and inherent weaknesses that allowed it to happen in the first place. Any other Lantern could look at him and say "Well, Parallax didn't take Kilowog or Brik, it took this guy, so there must be something wrong with him."
  • The comic in general does often point out how it wasn't Hal's fault but Parallax's, and mostly the only people still on his case about it are the Lost Lanterns. There's still the aspect of Hal feeling rather guilty about having Parallax take over him, but this element too is barely touched on. Of particular note is when Parallax took over Kyle Rayner and his dialogue pointed out insistently that he was just doing with Kyle what he did with Hal Jordan earlier and neither had any control over their actions.
    • Yes, but when Parallax took over Kyle, he did so very obviously, he had big scary teeth, was obviously and unapologetically evil, and didn't do any real damage. Hal, however, wasn't noticeably different in appearance, wiped out a good fraction of the Green Lantern Corps, and his actions weren't evil so much as desperate and misguided. Even if Hal wasn't responsible for his actions, his actions were all things that the other members of the Corps could easily imagine him doing.
      • I assumed either Parallax hadn't mastered his control of people or more likely the energy Hal absorbed from the Central Battery/Guardians prevented Parallax from completely suppressing his personality. This is why Hal was a Well-Intentioned Extremist when first possessed and an Ax Crazy Complete Monster the second time.
• Why are there only two Green Lanterns for a single space sector if said Space Sectors are 0.028% of the whole freaking universe!There are at least 100 billion galaxies in the universe,each containing billions to trillions of stars. Even if only one planet in a billion has an interstellar civilization, there would be trillions of interstellar races. And the Guardians intend 7200 people to look after all that?!
  • Some have posited that the DCU is smaller than our own. So that's one thing. If that doesn't cover enough, though, Earth is actually quite remarkable in its ability to support life; the chances of a given planet being able to hold life may be significantly less than one in a billion. Another theory is that the Guardians of the Universe are actually more like the Guardians of the Known Galaxies (twenty-eight?).
  • I remember Hal mentioning that there were only 138 planets with sentient life in Sector 2814. I can't remember the specific storyline, though.
    • It has been previously established that the Lanterns don't police the whole universe. There's the Unknown Sectors, where Emerald Warriors is taking place. Even in the 3600 sectors, there's places Lanterns don't go, such as the Vega system, and L.E.G.I.O.N.-patrolled space. Local governments seem to have a degree of choice in the matter as well, which was a minor plot point during New Krypton.
      • And I'd expect the Guardians to say they're the Guardians of the Universe instead of just "The Known Universe."
• Has it been shown yet what happens to Red Lanterns after they finally get revenge on the ones who wronged them?
  • If people like Batman are any indication, then seeking vengeance/justice doesn't stop when the person who wrongs you is dead. You'll just feel empty, and then find someone else that reminds you of the one who wronged you and get revenge on him as well, and so on. I imagine the Red Ring will keep this cycle up. Others like the host of the Butcher will lose their rage after getting revenge. But most of the current Red Lanterns were apparently recruited from the victims of the Sinestro Corps War, and the Sinestro Corps is still out there. Of course, Atrocitus could always blame all the evils of the universe on the Guardians, so his rage will remain continuous.
  • Not as yet. Though one assumes they would lose their Red Lantern powers (and possibly die since their hearts are no longer beating). That was more or less what happened to Atrocitus (minus the dying part) when they took him to Ryut and his grief overcame his rage.
    • Oh yeah, I forgot about that. Then again, Atrocitus didn't really let go of his rage in that situation -- it was just in remission.
    • True, but it's the only indication we've seen so far of what might happen when a Red Lantern loses his/her/its powers.
    • This makes Red Lanterns even more depressing. They either have to spend the rest of their lives in a state of incoherent rage and hatred or die when they let go of that rage.
    • Yeah, that does seem to be the idea. The Red Lanterns have always had a rather tragic air to them.
    • Even more tragic for Atrocitus: the Blue Lanterns can't alleviate him of his ring, since his heart was ripped out and without said ring, there's physically nothing left to pump blood.
    • Can't Blue Lanterns heal when powered up by a Green Lantern?
    • Exactly how do you cure someone whose heart was torn out, and their ring is the only thing keeping them alive?
    • With the aforementioned healing. Crazy thing about healing... it makes things avoid dying. That's why it's called healing instead of killing.
    • (facepalm) Yeah, but the guy's heart is still gone and there's no indication that they can do that. C'mon now.
    • Lantern rings are the most versatile tools in the universe. Making a new heart for Atrocitus should be child's play compared to, say, reducing the age of a dying star by a few bajillion years. All will be well.
  • Actually, it has been shown. Red Lantern Bleez killed the men who had kidnapped, raped, and tortured her. She's still a Red Lantern.
    • It has been shown now, but when this JBM question was originally written it hadn't been shown. Don't be a jerk.
• Why did Ray Palmer get an Indigo Lantern Ring in Blackest Night when Brightest Day revealed that the rings only choose those who have no compassion?
  • The rings don't choose CompleteMonsters, Indigo-1 does on the basis of Heel Face Brainwashing as a community service. Presumably when the selection is left to the automatic like with the other Corps, it gravitates to concentrations of compassion rather than voids.
    • OTOH, Ray does torture criminals in Cry For Justice later.
  • The ring's basic programming was based on Green Lantern rings. It normally seeks out persons of great compassion because this is the emotion the Indigo Tribe is based on. As has been pointed out, when left to its own devices the rings will seek out compassionate people. This was proven in Blackest Night when the ring spoke to Ray Plamer, explaining why he was chosen. Similarly, Proselyte sought out Shane Thompson when he was being crushed by an overturned ambulance but still more concerned for his patients than his own fate. It's been established before that the Corps can choose their candidates before they send the rings, which is Mogo's job. Presumably Indigo-1 does something similar, overriding the basic programming and has them seek out fellow Complete Monsters.
• How exactly is Ophidian supposed to be the serpent in the Garden of Eden? Ophidian is supposed to be the first creature to ever take what it didn't need, but the serpent at Eden is always described as convincing Eve to eat the forbidden fruit for whatever reason, and never taking anything for itself...
  • What Do You Mean Its Not Symbolic?. Also, Ophidian may not technically be the serpent at the biblical Garden Of Eden. In fact,the Garden of Eden thing could have happened multiple times in the cosmos. Alternatively,it could be interpreted as the serpent taking the privileges of Adam and Eve away, hence their banishment.
    • Given that we've already established at least two sets of Cain and Abel for certain^[1] and neither of those sets went remotely like the bible says in terms of fine details^[2], its a fairly safe assumption that there were also multiple gardens that also didn't match the text perfectly.
      • Aliens? I think you're reading too much into Gaiman's remark that Cain and Abel just happened along. No, in The Books of Magic, the Phantom Stranger notes that in prehistory Earth was both a globe that cooled from star-stuff and developed life over eons and a disk that was created by the gods and overrun by demons. The DCU has a Multiple Choice Past. Both Vandal Savage and Cain of Dreaming are the Biblical Cain, and doubtless others besides, depending on the story being told. Why? I dunno, Hypertime or whatever.
        • Might be multiple sets from different points in Earth's history coexisting. Seven Soldiers states outright that Earth has had several dozen Camelots throughout its history, with similar persons and events happening each time in a recurring historical motif. Cain and Abel were probably something similar- the first murder in any society or subspecies probably just kept following that motif of two brothers, one a shepherd and one a farmer.
    • tl;dr Theory of Narrative Causality

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• The "Emotional Spectrum" being a universal constant. Humans perceive the colors we do because we have 3 color receptors in our eyes with 3 particular peak absorbencies. If we had more or fewer receptors, we'd see a different number of colors, and if their peak absorbencies were different, the perceived boundaries between colors would be different to. There are plenty of animals on this very planet with different color receptors, yet we're supposed to believe that every intelligent species in the universe shares our color perceptions?
  • Chicken and the egg. Humans Are Special, and we are the most greatest thing to ever happen to Earth(at least where DC is concerned), the planet where life in the universe began. So maybe the Entity decided one day, "You know, for shits and giggles I'm going to make it so that Humans are one of the few races in the universe to be able to view the full and true color spectrum." or something along those lines. Maybe Rot Lop Fan (F-Sharp Bell, FTW!)'s people just got the short end of the stick as a random example.
    • Maybe Humans and a few other species are the only ones that can feel the full emotional spectrum.
  • Though, on that light, what to make of species that has a better perception of color than us, like our good friend the mantis shrimp(that has 10 color receptors on its eyes, IIRC)?
  • You're thinking about it backwards. It's not about the color spectrum, it's about the emotional spectrum. Some species may see more or fewer colors than humans do, but all sentient species experience the same spectrum of emotions. It just so happens that each emotion on the spectrum corresponds to a color, and humans see those colors as red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet. But the fact that humans see them in those colors is irrelevant. Remember, the names we give to colors are just words. There's no universal law that says the word "blue" has to refer to a soft, cool color resembling an ocean. Another species with another language would have completely different names for those seven colors.
    • Since the ring's translate from the person's native languages, at we have at least one blind Green Lantern whose oath refers to a specific sound rather than a color, you could conclude that for races that don't see the color green they call the Corps something else and the ring handles the translations with other races.

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• Why are the Guardians so resistant to learning lessons? They've been making mistakes literally since time began, but they still go out of their way to take the most idiotic course of action available to them.
  • Because DC is hell-bent on using the Guardians as a decades-long Aesop about arrogance and how intelligence =/= wisdom.

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• Catchy as it is, why exactly does the Green Lantern Oath rhyme... in English?
  • The translators built into the rings are really, really good. Presumably it rhymes in everybody's language, but we only "hear" it in English.
  • Out-Of-Universe Answer: it was originally Alan Scott's oath, from the time he was being written by Alfred Bester (yes, that Alfred Bester -- even sci-fi greats gotta eat) in the 1940's. Bester may or may not have come up with it himself -- he was never sure about that.
  • Well, the Oath doesn't seem to be universal; for instance that one blind Green Lantern, who had no concept of Lanterns, light or the color green had a unique Oath based around sound. Presumably all the Lanterns have a similar deal, with the Oath rhyming in their native tongue and being completely relevant. Perhaps the first step of training to be a Green Lantern for new races is to come up with your own variant on the Oath.
    • There have been quite a few Lantern oaths shown in the comic over the years. Alan Scott's was "And I shall shed my light over dark evil, for dark things cannot stand the light - the light of the Green Lantern!" Salaak would later use this in the first Green Lantern Corps series. Another was "In the beginning, there was nothing, fell and forever. Then there was life, and then there was light, and then the light of the Green Lantern, and then myself, to do it justice," used by Olapet of the Klyminade, who is her own daughter and her own mother. Pre-Crisis, Hal created his oath on his own. And of course, there was Rot Lop Fan's oath, created for him by Katma Tui: "In crashing din or hush, my ears catch evil's slightest sound. Let those who toll out evil's knell, beware my power: The F-Sharp Bell!" As mentioned above, his race has no concept of color or light, having evolved in the starless, lightless void known as the Obsidian Deeps. There have been others shown at various points, and prior to reigniting the central power battery on Oa, and thus restarting the Corps, Kyle Rayner didn't bother with an oath at all.
• Do they ever explain the little masks? A spattering of Lanterns across the board (Hal Jordan, Tomar-Re) wear them, but they aren't said to do anything.
  • They do something - they disguise the Lantern's identity so that they cannot be identified by the residents of their planet as anything other than "Green Lantern". How it actually disguises anything is much the same question as how those glasses disguise Superman's identity.
    • Ok... so why do only some of the Lanterns have masks, and others don't?
      • John stopped caring if anyone knew he was a Green Lantern and I don't recall Guy ever wore a mask in the first place, so he probably never cared at all. One Green Lantern is a member of a race which frowns on individuality, to the point that no one has a name. Wearing a mask could be seen as an attempt to express individuality. Cultural reasons perhaps explain the choices of whether a particular Lantern wears a mask or not.
  • Or it could just be a fashion choice. Kyle Rayner has proven to change his Green Lantern uniform on several occasions, and individual members can apparently customize their uniform however they please. Whether or not a Green Lantern chooses to incorporate a mask is up to him or her.
• The Oans are supposedly technologically advanced. Is there some sort of reason why they couldn't program the ring only to respond to the wills of the official wielder? The rings clearly have a small amount of intelligence and should be able to not only figure out if they're on the wrong person's finger, but also if the person wearing it is "worthy" in an emergency situation.
  • There is a difference between "technologically advanced enough to do something" and "clever enough to think of it and humble enough to admit that it could happen to your chosen representatives".
  • Considering the rings are set to automatically seek out a new wielder when the current one dies, it may simply not be feasible to put any kind of "lockout" programming in them. If only the "official wielder" were able to use a ring how then would the next wielder, who could be hundreds of light years away, be able to use it at all?
  • There are also been plenty of times where a Green Lantern has been incapacitated and his ring would need to be temporarily given to someone else in a crisis. A lock-out would prevent this from happening.
• If there is only one Anti-Matter universe how come there is alternate earth versions of Sinestro's that have yellow power rings?
  • The Weaponers of Qward get paid on commission, and get a tidy sum from every Sinestro they outfit with a Ring. Only selling to Earth-0 Sinestro would be bad business sense. Depending on if there's really just the 52 or if there is, as it seems to be getting, a much larger number developing, they may or may not have started needing to automate ringmaking to keep up with their exclusively-Sinestro demand (if it is just 52, they will likely do it one at a time).
    • Less humorously, substitute "get paid for" with "have their interests advanced by in the native universe of the Sinestro in question" and "business sense" with "tactics".
    • So the Anti-Matter universe can interact with other universe beside Earth 52.
• Do the emotional entities exist on other Earths and can more than one entity possess a person at the same time?
  • This depends on whether other Earths have Green Lanterns such as the main earth (The Tangent Earth's Green Lantern has an entirely different set of powers, so it's doubtful they exist in that universe). For the second part of the question, we don't know only because they haven't tried yet.
  • So basically Earths that do have Green Lantern Corps most likely have emotional entities, but do all Earths have a white life entity and Nekron or do all Earths share those two> As for the second part, it would be cool if they did try that because Krona could've done that instead.
    • During Blackest Night, Nekron banishes the Anti-Monitor and tells him "Go back to your own universe, this one is mine." If he is concerned with the rest of the 52, he doesn't show it. (The only universe hopping the Black Lanterns do involves going after Superboy-Prime, who killed them.)
• In the film, Hal demonstrates that the ring silently answers his questions for him almost as soon as he can think of them, provided it has that information in its database. Then he goes on to ask Tomar Re what the gigantic green light coming out of the center of Oa is. I get that they wanted to exposit for the audience, but wouldn't it have been easier to just make the ring answer his questions only when he directed them specifically towards it? Or am I supposed to believe that his ring didn't know about the central power battery which it was made from?
  • In-universe, the rings are semi-intelligent on their own so it might have decided to keep quiet and let Tomar Re exposit to Hal for the sake of encouraging camaraderie among fellow Lanterns. Out-of-universe, if the ring is transmitting all the exposition directly into Hal's brain then the audience doesn't get to hear it.
• Where do Atrocitus and the other Four Inversions fit into the DCU's demon spectrum? Are they literal demons, akin to Etrigan and Neron, or are they from a race of aliens sharing the name?
  • Aliens with demonic appearances and attitudes. During their Empire of Tears days, they could easily have been considered honorary demons. The Inversions were just a terrorist group that employed some mysticism in their methods.
• Why is it necessary for a Blue Lantern to be in the presence of a Green Lantern to activate their ring's full powers? I know the explanation given in the comics is that hope is useless without the willpower to enact it... but wouldn't that hold true for other emotions in the spectrum? I get why the power of life, death, and the ability to instill fear would be exempt from this reasoning, but shouldn't rage, greed, love, and compassion be just as ineffective as hope without the will to act on those emotions?
  • Somewhat explained by context. The Red Lanterns are utterly given over to their emotion, to the point that when Atrocitus begins calming down, they begin turning on him. Larfleeze's greed essentially rendered him impotent for eons, as he wanted to hoard his power in his own domain right up until he realized the blue light could free him from the side-effects of the orange, at which point he couldn't leave fast enough. The initiation rites for the Sinestro Corps involves channeling their own fears rather than overcoming them. The Star Sapphires and Indigo Tribesmen are apparently brainwashed outright. The Blue Lanterns, in contrast, wield hope more as aspiration and inspiration than as direct force. Johns views hope as needing direction, whereas the other emotions come with it.
  • More practically, Johns also wanted to have each Corps' abilities be radically different from the others, and was facing problems with that from day one (both the Star Sapphires and Sinestro Corps, having their origins predating the emotional spectrum as a concept, largely mirror the Green Lanterns' abilities). The Blue Lanterns' constructs are often not consciously controlled, and to contrast with Sinestro's old weakness of needing a Green Lantern ring to charge his own, the Blue Lantern rings overcharge the Green Lanterns' but are virtually useless on their own.
    • This came to a head when Larfleeze, explicitly stated to be the single most powerful ringbearer in the universe, lays siege to the Blue Lantern home world. Only a handful of Blue Lanterns exist, no Green Lantern is present to power even those few Blues, and yet the Blue Lanterns somehow hold Larfleeze off without a single casualty over the course of several issues.
      • Can't the Blue Lanterns make force-fields outside of a Green Lantern's influence? That could be why.
• This one bugs me film wise. Apart from fanservice, why is it that during the credits, Sinestro took the yellow ring? From what we saw Sinestro gave no hints to any displeasure or desires against the Guardians. There wasn't any clear motive what with Jordan proved, using Fear was bad and using Will could defeat it. So In-Universe, there's no clear cut reason.
• How is it that Green Lanterns can breathe in space?
  • They create a forcefield around themselves that keeps atmosphere in.
    • But shouldn't the air spoil pretty quickly? Or is the ring able to split CO2 back into oxygen and carbon again?
    • As I understand it, the ring's power set can accurately be characterized as, "It can do whatever the hell it wants."
• When Kyle Rayner was Ion, he could be in many places at once, bring back the dead, and halt an alien invasion in less time than it takes to say the word "Alien Invasion," and yet he is easily defeated by the Sinestro Corps. Later, Sodam Yat is easily beaten by Superboy Prime. Why is it that being Ion makes you totally not all-powerful?
  • Green is the most stable light, not the most powerful. It's the person behind the power that makes the Green Lanterns so formidable; so, the person Ion is inhabiting would have to exert a lot of willpower to become godly.
  • I think you're misunderstanding what happened. The first time Kyle was Ion he had absorbed the full power of the Green Lantern Central Power Battery, essentially giving him the combined power of the entire Green Lantern Corps. When he gave up that power he used it to recharge the Central Battery and restart the Corps. What you're thinking of is the second time he became Ion. That time he had only the power of his ring combined with the power of the Starheart (later retconned that he was the host to the Ion entity).
• Why can the green rings not seek out new bearers without Mogo's aid? All the other rings can and do find bearers on their own.
  • Mogo's like a big bank of willpower. He charges the rings and keeps a large supply of reserve rings, but he isn't strictly necessary for the rings to seek a bearer. He just acts in a supporting role, finding the best ring-bearers for the job. Without Mogo, the ring would probably just select candidates with great ability to overcome fear, but be morally bankrupt, like they did during Krona's reign.
  • He probably speeds the process up, too.

1. ↑ The set Dream collected and the set Vandal Savage is from
2. ↑ the ones in the Dreaming are implied to be aliens, Vandal Savage is a caveman