Green Lantern Corps #33 Review

GREEN LANTERN CORPS #33
Written by Peter J. Tomasi
Art by Patrick Gleason and Rebecca Buchman

As good as this issue was, I'm a little confused as to how it lines up with what's going on with Sinestro and the Red Lanterns over in Green Lantern.

In this issue, we have Mongul invading Daxam, homeworld of Sodam Yat, the current Ion, and the Daxamites, a xenophobic race of people that become Superman-like under the effects of a yellow star. They have a red star in their solar system, for reference.

After Mongul easily enslaves the entire population of Daxam, he sets up a Sinestro Corps beacon of light above the planet and calls the remaining Sinestro Corps members to Daxam, where he tries to set himself up as the new leader of the Corps.

This is where I'm a little confused. Isn't there a huge raid on the Red Lanterns' planet where the Sinestro Corps is attempting to free Sinestro? He was freed at the end of last issue, but there's absolutely no mention of what's going on over there and, for someone like Arkillo, who appears to be loyal to Sinestro, to show up on Daxam and not aid in the rescue of Sinestro, it just strikes me as odd.

Ignoring the timing of the two events and speaking of Arkillo, he doesn't take kindly to Mongul's attempted take over bid and challenges him to gladiatoral combat, which we'll, sadly, have to wait a month to see take place.

Meanwhile, there's all kinds of down time back on Oa where we have some great Guy and Kyle moments as they discuss the new "no fornication between Green Lanterns" law that the Guardians passed last issue. Seems the huge wave of rings that came in at the conclusion to that issue due to resignations only numbered a little over 200, which is still significant, but not as high as the images made it appear. Also, seems Mogo only helps send rings to new recruits if someone dies and they have to send all these rings back to Mogo to have them "recalibrated" to search for new people, meaning a short handed Corps for a while.

Continuing on (yes, this issue was jam packed with content), Kyle's recent trend to sketch very disturbing images of his fellow Green Lanterns, usually gruesome death scenes, is finally cleared up as we see he and Soranik Natu confess their feelings for each other and even share a forbidden kiss between fellow Green Lanterns. Natu is one of my favourite 'side characters' and it's nice to see her getting a bigger role. Hopefully she doesn't end up in the fridge like just about every other girlfriend Kyle has had.

Another great scene, although with no real significance that I can see, was between the Star Sapphire, Miri, who has Kryb in tow, and Green Lantern Saarek, the Lantern tasked with tracking down the Anti-Monitor's body and who can also speak to the dead. I'm not sure why, but I really enjoyed the dialogue between these two. Just handled really well.

Finally, Sodam Yat's mother crashes on Oa, directly in front of her son, and brings news of Daxam's fall to Mongul and the Sinestro Corps. Will Sodam willingly return to the people that cast him out? Will the Guardians send the GLC to save Daxam or leave it fall due to the lack of firepower with all the resignations? All I know is that this is definitely a great time to be reading both Green Lantern titles.

Verdict - Must Read. This looks like the beginnings of another Ranx vs Mogo-like epic, this time with the battle over Daxam. Couldn't believe how much content was packed into this one issue. Great stuff all around.

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