Posted in: Comics, Comics, DC Comics, Heritage Sponsored, Sponsored, Vintage Paper | Tagged: Alan Moore, dc comics, geoff johns, green lamtern, Green Lantern Corps

The Green Lantern Comic That Saw Alan Moore Trend This Weekend

Alan Moore was trending this weekend. Which is the kind of thing that always freaks people out, because in 2022 there's one thing that makes a comic book creator trend and no one is ready for that. But not to worry, as his son-in-law John Reppion tweeted "Alan Moore is trending on Twitter. Alan Moore is sitting in his living room drinking a cup of tea, oblivious" adding "I made him a cup of tea just before I left his house, so he was definitely drinking one when I tweeted that."

It began with a tweet by Casanova Franklinstein recalling a classic Alan Attack, "alan moore calling geoff johns a mediocre racoon rifling though the trashcans of his betters might be one of the most accurate burns ever." This was replied to by OceanPullsMeClose posting screencaps of Reppion's wife and Alan Moore's daughter, Leah Moore, giving the big explanation of why Alan is the way he is regarding superhero comics, and how it is a tragedy of our own making. Bleeding Cool also collated those tweets back in 2019. And it was these tweet that exploded and saw "Alan Moore" trend on social media.

And yes, the thing with Geoff Johns happened. in a 2009 interview with Kurt Amacker at no-longer-there Mania in 2009. While recapping his opinions, over how he negatively influenced his superhero genre as a whole, he stated;

"I was noticing that DC seems to have based one of its latest crossovers in Green Lantern based on a couple of eight-page stories that I did 25 or 30 years ago. I would have thought that would seem kind of desperate and humiliating, When I have said in interviews that it doesn't look like the American comic book industry has had an idea of its own in the past 20 or 30 years, I was just being mean. I didn't expect the companies concerned to more or less say, "Yeah, he's right. Let's see if we can find another one of his stories from 30 years ago to turn into some spectacular saga.""

That was Blackest Night, the major DC Comics event in 2009 written by Geoff Johns that drew heavily on a short story by Alan Moore and Kevin O'Neill that appeared in Tales Of The Green Lantern Corps Annual #2 in 1986, the story Tygers named after the poem by Alan Moore's favourite writer/artist William Blake, also namechecked that year in Watchmen.

The comic saw Green Lantern Abin Sur encounter the equivalent of the Three Witches, Qull of the Five Inversions, who tells him his future, that Sur will die when his ring fails him at a critical moment, that his successor will be the greatest amongst his contemporaries, and is also told of the "final catastrophe" that will result in the complete oblivion of the Corps.

And naming demons and future enemies as Roxeaume of the Five Inversions, the Weaponers of Qward, Ranx the Sentient City, the Children of the White Lobe, Ysmault, Ranx, The Empire of Tears, the fall of Sodam Yat, the ultimate Green Lantern and the destruction of Mogo. Just as with Macbeth, the very act of prophecy leads to his doom.

The figures and events named would later be used by Geoff Johns to create the Blackest Night event……twenty-three years later.

The 1986 comic book in question is currently up for auction from Heritage Arts in a 9.4 CGC condition and going under the hammer later today. If/when that Green Lantern TV series comes to fruition, they are not going to be able to resist using all of these either, and these are their first appearances.

Green Lantern Corps Annual #2 (DC, 1986) CGC NM 9.4 White pages. First appearance of Qull, Sodam Yat, and Ranx the Sentient City. Introduction of the prophecy of "The Blackest Night". Alan Moore stories. Bill Willingham and Kevin O'Neill art. Overstreet 2022 NM- 9.2 value = $5. CGC census 8/22: 6 in 9.4, 32 higher.

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