Review: Red Lanterns Volume I

(Disclaimer, this was supposed to be last week's update but due to a complicated series of events, it didn't get published but I thought it did. Sorry.)

Lemme spin you a sad, sad yarn.

Way, way out in this outrageously fucked up Universe of ours, long, long ago in the past (and I do mean long, we’re talking thousands of years ago) there were a bunch of ludicrously powerful short blue skinned weirdos named the Guardians of the Universe (who for a bunch of “Guardians” seem like a bunch of amoral, emotionless a-holes to me. At least in modern comics they do.) Who sought to protect those in the Universe with a vast army of powerful robots known as Manhunters.

One of them however, a Guardian named Krona didn’t think this was a good idea. But instead of arguing his point, chose to prove his point in the rudest, most assholish way he possibly could.

No he didn’t think of shooting their pets, the Guardians didn’t even have them (plus, they don’t have any animals that’d last as long as they do.)

Instead he put modifications into the Manhunters that would make them wipe out a whole section of space with the unfortunate name of “Sector 666.”
Such a sad story, but it didn’t end there.

As the Sector was decimated, only five beings survived. One of them was a…whatever his species’ name was (guessing by his planet’s name it’s Ryutians) named Atros. Atros was a psychology student who witnessed his own family get slaughtered by the androids.

Fueled by rage, he renamed himself Atrocitus and became a terrorist along with the other four survivors and became obsessed with getting revenge on the Guardins. In this goal however, he failed and was imprisoned on the planet Ysmault.

Truth is, I could spend this whole review talking about Atrocitus but you didn’t come here to read a full origin (that’s what Wikipedia’s for) so I’ll get to the point with Mr. “Rage filled alien emo.”

Long story short, due to a prophecy he learned involving a dickish entity of death, the Guardians admitting they were liars, and undead zombie superhumans, Atrocitus used his rage to form a lantern corps based purely around rage…a Red Lantern Corps.

There’s a lot of history here but what we’re doing is reading up on some adventures of him and his group.

In the beginning, we see a group of blue skinned reptilian aliens with a fetish for torture; they’re working over some poor shmuck they caught…or were, the poor boy’s dead.

 Their religion was probably based off of this.

While they lament the lack of creatures to torment, their spirits are lifted when a blue furred pussycat floats in.

Unfortunately for them, this was Dex-Star of the Red Lantern Corps.

Dex-Star was originally a cat from Earth named Dexter, abandoned as a young kitten he was found by a young woman who loved him very much.

But unlike Courage the Cowardly Dog, his owner was murdered by a burglar. The police who came to look into this found no use for a cat (not even a half assed fur coat) and threw him out into the streets.

Destitute and without hope, Dexter wandered the streets until a pair of thugs threw him off the Brooklyn Bridge, but in his despair rage was triggered.

And in a deus ex machina most cats in the 1900s would have given their nine lives for, his anger was great enough to attract a Red Lantern Ring.

Transforming into a Red Lantern, he laid waste to both thugs and used their skulls for a macabre kitty bed (bet you wish your cat could do that.)
Anyways, despite being stronger than the average kitty-cat, the torture fetishists are able to restrain him. Apparently spitting acid and flying through deep space without a ship is one thing, but in the case of such a small creature, enhanced strength doesn’t help that much.

But the story doesn’t end here, for the cat is rescued by Atrocitus who proceeds to show the torture fetishists that (to quote a line written by a friend of mine) “Pain ain’t so orgasmic after all” by slaughtering them for attacking his cat.

Yep, nine times out of ten, trying to skin the cat of a professional rage junkie is always a bad idea.

Now that you have the set up, let me tell you a more summarized version of the rest of the volume.

The story tells us of both Atrocitus’ concern over his rage becoming less pure and his frustration over the aimless direction the red Lanterns have been taking. Most of them are about as dumb as a post and completely blinded by rage, except for Atrocitus himself.

As he tries to think of a way to change this, he goes over to his most prized possession…the corpse of Krona himself (try not to think about it.)

Goddammit! What did I just tell you?

No! He was not planning on necrophilia despite his claiming he and Krona are “Married in Rage” (though the remark itself is still pretty fucking creepy), now the story of how he got the corpse is one for a different time (Wikipedia beckons) but I will tell you what the cosmic cadaver is for.

Atrocitus likes to talk to it like the creepiest psychologist you could imagine, while wondering aloud how to handle his anger problems (and not in the way you’d usually want this type of advice) he yanks out some of Krona’s blood and offers a sacrifice to…the universe apparently.
Atrocitus achieved a vision where he looked o’er the universe and witnessed acts of enormous cruelty, and that certainly helped this problem with anger.

Deciding to take a page out of Frank Castle’s book, Atrocitus chose to use his Red Lanterns to avenge great injustices across the universe. Starting by going to the planet of Ghan IX and executing soldiers of a war based government for killing two children after "mistaking them for armed insurgents".

Now who does that remind us of?

When Atrocitus comes back, he decides to improve the intelligence of his Red Lanterns by hurling them into a “blood ocean” that somehow made them regain their intelligence…after reliving through whatever trauma they suffered to make them a Red Lantern in the first place.

He decides to use his lackey Bleez, a woman from a race of beings that looked like blue skinned angels named Havanians and was supposedly the most beautiful of their number...ever.

 And to be honest, she still is.

She became a Red Lantern after getting tortured and gang raped by Sinestro Corps members after a pair of suitors she’d rejected hired them to get revenge on her.

Bleez looks a lot like Morrigan Aensland because of a mask she wears to hide her beauty to keep it from being used against her ever again…which is confusing because her outfit does nothing to hide her figure, especially where her rump is concerned.

 Pictured: How she controls the Red Lanterns

Giving Bleez intelligence however proves to be a bad idea as she soon shows signs of wanting control of the Red Lantern Corps.

In other words, she’s a fan of Starscream to such an extent that she’s actively imitating him.

So much in fact, she was even like this before she gained intelligence; something that is viewed by pretty much everyone as impossible.

When she came out of the blood ocean, Bleez wasn’t very happy with her master at all. Her intellect came back alright, but she also suffered the trauma that made her a Red Lantern in the first place return. She was too scarred to help him lead the Red Lanterns like he’d wanted.

Atrocitus however comes up with a plan to fix this by bringing her back to Havania (her home planet) to get revenge on her former suitors.

 Not a bride, but she's close.

As she seeked out her revenge, Bleez went to her mother’s corpse and showed a severe lack of responsibility for any actions she did by reenacting “I Spit on your Grave” in name only and claiming her mother’s desire for grandchild caused all her trouble.

When Bleez finally got around to her revenge, she killed one of the two suitors who arranged her torment. But the other she chose to spare as a form of psychological torment (possibly planning to kill him later) but Atrocitus lacked about as much patience as Bart Allen after consuming a literal mountain of sugar and objected to this. And when I say ‘objected’ I mean he impaled him with his hand.
When he returned to their home base of the planet Ysmault, Atrocitus realizes she might have tricked him into giving her intelligence back by creating an upheaval in the Red Lanterns.

Determined to find out more, he takes a page out of Dracula’s book and consumes some blood from a Red Lantern to take his memories.

So Atrocitus is a Little Sister. Who knew?

What he learns is that Bleez, even as a mindless brute was somehow plotting something against him. When he can’t get the information he wants through this, he hurls the being (a former criminal named Skallox) and two other Red Lanterns (one of which was a hovering brain like creature with tentacles named Ratchet, who was became a Red Lantern after his government detained and tortured him…purely for wanting friends outside of the internet) into the Blood Ocean to give their minds back.

Frustrated with his circumstances, Atrocitus went off to destroy a sadistic cult that blinds girls after puberty and excuting a pair of assholes on Earth.

When the rage master returns to his home he finds the body of Krona mysteriously missing. The leader of the Red Lanterns accuses Bleez of taking the corpse for some reason (whilst in the meanwhile all this talk over Krona’s corpse is beginning to strike me as pretty fucking creepy.)

About as creepy as her and Garth Ennis combined.

It is now that I wish to address a plot element you haven’t been told yet.

Throughout the book, we are given cuts to a city in England. In it we see a pair of brothers named Raymond and Jack Moore, one a hot blooded and courageous man while the other a bookworm who never allowed himself to be angry, even after his schoolmates bullied him for years.

Their story begins when a mugger kills their grandfather, Raymond is incredibly angry at this and desired to avenge his death, Jack on the other hand thinks it should be left to the police.

Determined to get revenge, Raymond tried to firebomb the thug’s house only to get stopped by Jack and drive a rift between the two.

The police went out to arrest Raymond, realizing he probably tried to commit the firebombing. He went to Jack’s house in hopes of hiding but the brother refused to do so.

Now I’ll break out of my summary for a moment to say…WHAT THE FUCK WAS HE THINKING? Yes Raymond did try to firebomb a shitbag’s house but the guy had it coming to him, and besides that, you never sell out family unless they betray you. Raymond didn’t do that but Jack did.

Which makes what happens to him a fitting punishment, after all he never really got angry before this.

As the police prepare to drag Raymond away, he fights back with his fists and being the sadists they are, the police brutally beat him to beat on the sidewalk.

Given the place this happened, they were probably Glaswegian.

Doubles as a cop when he isn't drowning people.

Jack became overcome with rage, and in this moment of great despair he attracted a Red Lantern Ring and got turned into another of its member…as the first and only human in its ranks.

Now the police are understandably shocked by this and as Jack begins to rise again as a bloodthirsty lunatic, he melts one of the cops with the blood acid and begins wondering about what he’s became.

Later he goes out to try and kill the thug who murdered his grandfather (and in a roundabout way, killed his brother as well), first visiting his grandfather’s grave…and accidentally destroying it.

This, dear readers is what one calls: Does not know their own strength.
Upon destroying it by accident, he grabbed the gravestone (which survived, and possibly has some kind of tombstone survivors guilt) and flew out to find said thug.

The police get ahead of him and attempt to drive the bastard into protective custody. This proves futile however, as armored cars weren’t built for protection against Red Lanterns.

Or psychotic clowns.

The thug attempts to plead for mercy but Jack wouldn’t (due to the Ring though honestly he should’ve done this without a ring since this thug did kill his family) and attempted to smash his head with the tombstone.
Unfortunately the shitbag’s life was saved by Guy Gardner, and as such doesn’t get killed. Granted this is what Green Lanterns are supposed to do, but that was a stupider decision than killing off the Wasp.

Guy fights the Red Lantern and attempts to talk him down, because he himself was able to resist such a ring, while he figured out that Jack was able to partially resist the ring at least enough to mutter some request for help the fight ended with the ring itself calling him into deep space.

Now that I’ve settled this little business, let me get back to the main story and why I made this pitstop in our journey.

Back at his base, Atrocitus had failed to regain control of the Red Lanterns despite his plans to beat the Hell outta Bleez until she told him where Krona’s corpse went.

Bleez knew nothing and the other Red Lanterns stood up for her, Atrocitus tried to justify himself but quickly realized that he shouldn’t have to.

By the end of the volume, Atrocitus is trying to find where his shrink went and Bleez is using to Red Lanterns to get revenge on the Sinestro Corps.

 She used the Red Lanterns because her ass couldn't manipulate 300 Spartans.

Atrocitus eventually figures out where it went, sometime prior he’d taken a page from Dr. Frankenstein’s book and tried to create life. Why he did it and when this was shown is a mystery to me but from what I read, the creatures all hate him.

One of them, a deformed and musclebound giant named Abysmus came up with the idea of eating Krona’s body to gain his power, then using his skin as a garment.

Atrocitus quickly realizes that this alien Leatherface wannabe is wearing Krona’s skin and using his powers, and realizes that killing him may be the closest he ever comes to killing the murderer of his people.

The founder of the Red Lanterns fought fiercely, probably hoping to perform some very nasty things to his former creation when he was finished (given his long lifespan he’d probably outdo the assholes that made Saw in terms of gore) when Jack Moore finally shows up.

Atrocitus didn’t recall him being allowed on his planet and is distracted long enough for Abysmus to impale him with a jagged stick he pulled up from the ground.

As Atrocitus is wounded, the creatures close in around him and Jack, the story ending on this ominous note.

Now that I have completed this tale, lemme give you my personal opinion since I pretty much just repeated what you’ll find on Wikipedia.

The comic is pretty good, I never knew too much about the Red Lanterns before but I was surprised at how it portrayed Atrocitus, he’s like some kind of cosmic Punisher or something.

Picured: Something that should have been a parody.

Bleez was an interesting character as well, originally I believed her to just be made for the New Guardians series (where I first saw her immersion into the Blood Ocean.) While my favorite Red Lanterns, this shouldn’t be too surprising since she looks like Morrigan Aensland and like her is extremely hot.

The story of Jack Moore was interesting to read too, though originally I thought his brother’d be a Red Lantern (but then again, it isn’t that kind of book.) Though I’m still a bit pissed that Moore’s family wasn’t avenged, especially since the police attempted to justify beating a man to death purely for shoving them, resisting arrest is one thing but that is completely disproportionate.
What I also gotta add is that this comic has gotten me interested in the Red Lanterns enough to continue reading the series…once I find Volume II.

The story of how Ratchet turned into a Red Lantern showed a culture based completely around isolation, and his story is particularly sad; when you compare it to the stories of Skallox, who was criminal pond scum before turning Red Lantern and (to a lesser extent) Bleez, who was a major bitch even before she accepted the rage.

Anyhoo, this review is finished, I’ve yet to decide my next review but if anyone out there has any ideas what I should do next I’m all ears…unless the review is for anything by Garth Ennis.

But as much as I’d like to explain how much I hate this guy, that’s a post due for some other time in another galaxy

I mean, that’s where the Legion of Doom comes from doesn’t it? Even though several of its members clearly come from Earth.
Well, see y’all. Hopefully we can make it through lunch without Kanye West deciding to interrupt it (like he does to everything else)…or the Juggernaut deciding to rape my house again.

 Oh God! Here he comes again!!!