#oh I could do kara she's part of the jli

[green-lanterns-c0ck]

Send me a character and I’ll tell you a song lyric that reminds me of them. - Guy (and if u want also any other JLI character that you like)

I have... many songs for Guy... I'll try to sort them by time frame, vaguely. This will probably be very cringe but I refuse to apologize. It also got really long, so I'm putting it under a read more lol.

TL:DR:

JLI Era Guy - Industry Baby by Lil Nas X: "You was never really rootin' for me anyway / When I'm back up at the top I wanna hear you say / He don't run from nothin', dog / Get your soldiers, tell em that the break is over"

Yellow Ring Guy - Lips Shut by Nina Chupa: "I killed kindness, with my own violence / I'm thinking twice now, I'm on the brink of niceness"

Warriors Guy - Under The Pressure by The Score: "No, not today / Not gonna make the same mistakes / No, not today / Not gonna cave, not gonna break "

Post-Warriors Guy - Born For This by The Score: "We are the warriors, who learned to love the pain / We come from different places but have the same name / 'Cause we were born for this / We are the broken ones, who chose to spark a flame / Watch as our fire rages, our hearts are never tame / Cause we were, 'cause we were born for this / We were born for this"

JLI Green Lantern Guy: Industry Baby by Lil Nas X

"And this one is for the champions

I ain't lost since I began, yeah

Funny how you said it was the end, yeah

Then I went did it again, yeah

I told you long ago, on the road

I got what they waitin' for

I don't run from nothin', dog

Get your soldiers, tell 'em I ain't layin' low

You was never really rootin' for me anyway

When I'm back up at the top I wanna hear you say

He don't run from nothin', dog

Get your soldiers, tell 'em that the break is over"

I think it fits Guy in that time period really well, because his life's - his life's pretty shit. He's recently come out of a six year (-ish) coma, he's lost his job and his ability to do his job, he has two - three friends max, and even they get annoyed and angry at him often. He gets treated so unfairly and is being given... very little consideration and compassion or awknowledgement for the good he does.

If I was in Guy's position, I'd probably throw the towel really fast, but Guy's not the kind of person to give up, even if going on hurts him and he's so desperate to prove himself. He wants people to see how good he is, he wants to be awknowledged as the Top Guy (hehe), by the JLI and the GL corps. He's treading water and still swimming upstream, no matter what.

Yellow Ring Guy: Lips Shut by Nina Chupa

"I killed kindness, with my own violence

I'm thinking twice now, I'm on the brink of niceness

With myself in hindsight, I should love the highlights

I should treat myself right

I should not be scared of night time thoughts

That I'm not enough for my own life

[...]

I hear a million carbon copies of myself

And every single one of them is shouting

You should go to hell

The more they talk the more I think I might as well

And maybe, maybe I should sew their lips shut

They want me praying at the altar of my doubt

They shout Judas in the flesh has come around

So it's supper for suckers before I'm out

I should sew their lips shut"

I love the opening lines of this song for Guy, because when Guy first gets his yellow ring he is literally on the brink of niceness and he struggles with it. He's trying so hard to kill kindness with his violence, but he can't, because Tora has shown him kindness and made him show his own niceness and now he can't stop! He's a softie! He hates it! I love him!

This period of Guy's life is about him healing, from the downward spiral he was in since he got trapped in the Phantom Zone - he's realizing he doesn't have to be the though Guy leader all the time, he gets friends who genuinely like him, in an uncomplicated way (Sally... My fave), because he can have relationships like that again and he's getting better, feeling steadier and calmer, he starts not hating himself so much and being less insecure, because for so long, being a Green Lantern was the only thing that gave him value and now it's gone and Guy's still here, he picked up the pieces of himself and found... that he's still worth something, if he tries to be. And he does, even when other people don't accept him or value him. (Superman, the League after Tora's death...)

Guy has lost everything at least twice now, and he's still going on and I think that's the point where he gains his amazing confidence in himself, because he knows he can pick himself back up now, no matter what, even if he has to do it alone.

Warrior Guy: Under the Pressure by The Score

"Fear wears a smile but I'll be the last one laughing

Try to take me down, no it ain't ever gonna happen, no, oh oh

No, not today

Not gonna make the same mistakes

No, not today

Not gonna cave, not gonna break

Under the pressure

Under the pressure

(I'm never gonna break)

(No matter what it takes)

Pressure, pressure calls my name

I think it's time that I should

Push it back and entertain it

Forever, ever like a game

Stacked up the cards against me

Now I think my luck is changing"

As Warrior, Guy finally gets a fucking break, he's still going through a lot (Tora's death, his own death during Our Worlds At War, Arisia...) BUT he finally has friends, finally has a real home, is finally happy with his life again. He gets visited by other heroes, they meet at Warriors, children look up to him again - Guy's finally settled into his skin again. He knows who he is again, he knows what he can do, he knows what he's worth. He's calmed down and steady, able to support others, like Kyle and Zinda, and Impulse, and - and everyone who comes through the door long enough to be spotted.

Warrior Guy is so wonderfully warm, and open, and accepting. I really do think this is the ideal Future for Guy - being able to grow old as a fixture of the hero community, someone the younger generations all look up to and can lean on, call on for advice, someone incredibly dependable.

But still rough around the edges, and inappropriate at times, headstrong and stubborn, difficult to get along with. Because by god, has Guy learned how little being nice and normal will get you, how little people will give you if you struggle like he has. If someone sticks around while he's a gruff and rude asshole, they're gonna stick around. If someone's only friends with him while Guy plays nice, polishes off his accent and his crude jokes, then they're gonna drop him as soon as things get difficult.

He's found his people now, in his Warriors Crew, in Zinda, in Ted, in Kyle, even in Bea and he's content now.

Post-Warrior Green Lantern Guy: Born for this by The Score

"We are the warriors, who learned to love the pain

We come from different places but have the same name

'Cause we were born for this

We are the broken ones, who chose to spark a flame

Watch as our fire rages, our hearts are never tame

'Cause we were, 'cause we were,

'Cause we were, 'cause we were born for this

We were born for this

I've struggled for years and

Through all of the tears

I've faced the doubts I hide

I never gave into my fears deep within

'Cause I heard my voice inside

I know I was born for this

I know I was born for this

I will never lose my voice

If I cut out all the noise

I know, I was born for this

I know, I was born for this

I believe, I believe

We can write our story

I believe, I believe

We can be an army

[...]

These words that I write are for someone like me

To know you're not alone

The moves that you make ya they come with mistakes

Don't ever lose your hope

Just know, you were born for this

Just know, you were born for this"

This one is kinda my anthem of the entire New Green Lantern Corps, but it's always tied up with Guy specifically. I hate every word Geoff Johns has ever written with a burning passion, but I love Guy rejoining the Corps and getting to be a mentor, and appreciated and loving the Corps so much and finally getting loved in return, and finally, finally getting part of the group, of the family. After literal decades of being an outsider, Guy is finally part of the family. I am going to make myself cry.

Like, Guy is more than just a Green Lantern, he has lived without the Corps before and he can do it again, he doesn't need them - but he loves them. He loves them so much. Guy has loved the Corps with all his heart ever since he first put on the ring, first recited the vow, and by god he has never stopped loving it and his fellow Lanterns, even while he was in a coma, even while they treated him like shit, even when he wasn't a Lantern anymore. Guy has loved the Corps for decades, and he's finally getting loved back. He was born for this, and he's home.

[pluckyredhead]

What did Tom King do to Kara?

you don't like woman of tomorrow? thats interesting, from what i can tell that seems to be one of king's least uncontroversial DC works and gets unanimous praise from the fandom + comic readers in general (not that i've read it myself, just from what i've seen)

Combining these two related asks!

I want to start out by saying that ALL of my problems are with the writing - Bilquis Evely's art is breathtaking and I wish it was being used to tell a story that deserves it.

I have two problems with Woman of Tomorrow:

King does the same thing to her that he has done with literally every other character, which is to cherrypick their history to tell the bleakest, most nihilistic, least heroic story possible. It's not super noticeable with Batman because Bruce is kind of always in that zone, but it's very obvious with characters like Wally West (Heroes in Crisis: Therapy Is Bad and Will Kill You), the JLI in Human Target, and Kara. His Kara is a depressed, foulmouthed, murderous drunk who spends the entire book suffering physical and mental torments. I am just so exhausted by the lack of creativity. Dude is a one trick pony and I don't understand why this isn't more widely recognized. (Oh wait, I do, it's because pessimism is so often mistaken for genius, and also he loves a nine panel grid which too many people think immediately makes a comic Deep (TM) instead of just copying Watchmen.)

THE STORY ISN'T EVEN ABOUT HER!!! The main character is Ruthye, the alien girl who hires Supergirl to avenge the death of her father. Ruthye narrates the book. Ruthye drives the plot. Ruthye has the emotional arc. Kara could be replaced by any Super or other strong alien - J'onn, Sodam Yat, fucking LOBO - and the story would be exactly the same. (Because it would be True Grit. It's literally just True Grit But Supergirl Is There.)

Now, there's a place for bleak and even completely pessimistic, nihilistic stories - but Supergirl ain't fucking it. Supergirl was created to give little girls a heroine to look up to who had all the powers of Superman. She is aspirational and inspirational. She is joy.

Woman of Tomorrow is aggressively Not For Little Girls. To me, it radiates a deep contempt for the idea of Supergirl as a happy, kid-friendly character. It drags her through the mud on purpose, and then looks at you like it's making a point, but the point is just "mud exists." Yeah, Tom, I know. WE ALL KNOW.

(In general, King seems to really hate the idea of "nice" girls - look at what he did to Tora in Human Target. There's an issue of WoT that flashes back to Kara's origin and the destruction of Krypton - except it goes all the way back to the Silver Age, which is a generally bright and happy era, and pulls directly from that version of events while also making it as bleak as possible. Like, at one point Kara finds a dead baby on the sidewalk. HE PUT A DEAD BABY IN THE SILVER AGE. HE IGNORED THE FACT THAT THIS ORIGIN IS FOUR REBOOTS OUT OF DATE IN ORDER TO PUT A DEAD BABY IN THE SILVER AGE.)

I wouldn't be nearly as angry about this book if it wasn't capping off 20 years of DC treating Kara like shit, but since she returned in 2003, they have had her try to murder Clark, had her sexually preyed on by Darkseid, implied an incestuous relationship with her father, had her be abused, made her a blood-vomit-spewing Red Lantern (an arc I actually liked because Guy Gardner as Kara's Space Dad has my whole heart, but it's part and parcel of Angry Violent Sexy Kara), had her infected by the fucking Batman Who Laughs, and more. And that's when they even bother to publish her! They refused to give her a 60th anniversary special in 2019 because "she has a TV show," even though Two-Face got a 75th anniversary special a couple years before. Fucking Two-Face!!! Kara didn't even have a regular comic for much of the run of her show, because why court an audience of millions when so many of them are icky women?

Grant Morrison said it recently and said it best (they were talking about "Superman as fascist," but I think it applies to this too):

"Why, I say, oh why, is it so hard to simply serve the concept and write the adventures of a smart, creative and kind-hearted teenage girl with superpowers?

[...]

"To undermine the fundamental appeal of superheroes like Superman and Supergirl by re-casting them as anti-heroes at best or outright monsters - dragging imaginary childhood paragons off their pedestals to reinforce a fairly facile point about the tendency of real world heroes to exhibit feet of clay, struck me and strikes me still as imaginatively lazy.

"Using kids’ adventure heroes to make hackneyed observations about typical human behaviour that does not in fact apply to made up comic book characters strikes me as – I don’t know - whimsical? Dilettantish? A squandering of energy and creativity?"

Supergirl isn't for the edgelords of the world. She isn't a tool for reiterating, yet again, that life is pointless and full of pain. She is intended to inspire little girls, and anyone who doesn't understand that has no business writing her.