The Four Color Media Monitor

The Green Lantern franchise may be one of DC's most abused for the sake of ideology, and in this Games Radar/Newsarama article, the news site helps the publisher and writer James Tynion, who's homosexual himself, continue to shovel that propaganda down everyone's throats:

In 'Green Lantern: Alan Scott' by writer James Tynion IV and artist Stephen Byrne, Alan, one of DC's oldest superheroes, comes out to his adult children Jade and Obsidian.

Despite the universe-threatening supervillains he's faced for decades, Tynion's story reveals a man who has to gather the courage to say it aloud.

But not try to change, overcome or abandon it, right? Nothing but a disfavor to the memory of Bill Finger and Martin Nodell, exploiting their creation for the sake of shoddy ideology and lifestyle beliefs.

"Back in an earlier time, I kept a part of myself hidden from my friends and peers," Alan begins. "I even let myself get married a few times to women I did love with all my mind, but I did that knowing there was something about myself I was hiding away."

Obsidian, who clearly already knows what Alan is trying to articulate, encourages him to just say the words.

"I'm gay," Alan reveals.

While Alan's truth comes as a surprise to an unequivocally supportive Jade, his story has slowly been revealed to DC readers over the last decade.

If memory serves, when Judd Winick was working in comicdom and assigned to GL for at least 2 years, he put words in Jade's mouth, telling Kyle Rayner that nothing was wrong with a homosexual teen named Terry Berg. Whether or not that's still canon, the way they depict her here, feeling surprised, sounds awfully strange, like Tynion's trying to make her sound stupid. Predictably, Obsidian remains homosexual in this rendition, no thanks to Dan Jurgens, who may have been responsible for that shift as early as 1994 (although, as noted further down, it may have actually been a certain other writer, much worse, who was responsible, and the name given is a really startling eyebrow raiser). Equally insulting is the use of "reveal" instead of retcon, and I think Alan was only married to two women, one being Rose Canton/Thorn, Jade and Obsidian's parents, and then Molly Mayne/Harlequin. And this direction is decidedly insulting to the writers who had Alan marry Molly in the past few decades, as it sounds like he no longer is. Now, here's Tynion's excuses for this drivel rendition:

Tynion tells Newsarama there are a few answers to the question of why he decided to approach the classic Alan Scott from this direction, and why was it important for him to include this story in Infinite Frontier #0.

"First off, there was a promise made a number of years ago when the Earth 2 books were coming out as a part of the 'New 52'," Tynion says. "That's when the Earth 2 version of Alan Scott came out and the DC publisher made the promise that Alan Scott, from here on out, would be a queer character across the DC Multiverse and the premiere gay male hero of the larger DC mythology.

"As we started bringing back the classic version of the Justice Society and we started down the road that we knew was going to end with a reunified history of the DC universe, a history that has the Justice Society back in the '40s, that has Infinity Inc. popping up as the next generation of the Justice Society, and all of the relationships that came out of that, it was really important to me that this promise be kept."

"I was thrilled to bring this moment to life with the incredible Stephen Byrne, who I've wanted to work with for years," Tynion continues. "He brought the pathos needed to do it right, and help introduce a whole new generation to Alan Scott, Jade, and Obsidian."

Tynion explains to us that when he was approached to write a story for the Green Lantern 80th Anniversary special last year ("which had amazing art by Gary Frank," he says), he was eager to take part and wanted to use the story to "cement who the new present-day version of Alan Scott is going to be."

"Once we started setting up Infinite Frontier and I started hearing Alan Scott would be a character who would continue to play into the central through-line of what's building out of Infinite Frontier, as a queer, male creator I wanted to make sure that some of the pieces landed in a way that opened up the most story potential, and would also embrace all of the complexities of what being a queer man who couldn't come out for most of his life would be, even in the crazy world of superheroes," he explains.

As expected, what we have here is an entitled ideologue shamelessly appropriating other people's creations and forcing his beliefs and lifestyle practices onto them, all under the confidence that, because this is a corporate owned publisher, he can get away with anything, and according to modern PC standards, depicting the characters as the simpler figures they once were is not allowed. Notice how he babbles about a "promise" made? Apparently his idea of how to ensure damage will be compounded to suit his vision. Was this promise also made to Roy Thomas, who was dismayed a decade ago? Since there's no mention of Thomas here and whether Tynion understands how the veteran feels, I guess that says all we need to know what Tynion and interviewer think. No wonder they don't belong in this business.

"One thing that I was really, really adamant about was this: I heard some casual conversations about how to make it work. Do we erase Jade and Obsidian from continuity, or do we want to tweak them so they're not Alan Scott's children?

"My answer: no. Alan Scott is a queer man who was an adult in the '40s who then had an extended life because of everything that he's been involved with, and there are so many adult queer men with adult children. It's a very human experience."

The writer says he thinks this experience plays into the estrangement that has "always been core" to the relationship between Alan Scott, Jade, and Obsidian.

"And I think it adds a new rich depth to their relationship," Tynion says. "And, it opens up a whole new world of stories that I'm really, really excited about. It was me wanting to help land the plane here… to set the groundwork for a whole bunch of new stories, heading into the future."

It adds nothing beyond what we already know, but a cliche that's been forced into mainstream for years on end, at the expense of heterosexuality. When the 2 children debuted in the early 80s, they were anything but estranged from their biological dad, because for years, they'd grown up without him, having lived in foster homes after their mother gave them up for adoption, and Alan didn't know anything about them till they came of age and located him to discuss their assumptions they were his biological children. And I guess Tynion really believes what he says about "only so many" like him being parents? Certainly, there are some (though you could argue it's more a case of their being bisexual). But realizing how these ideologues think, he must believe there's whole populations coast to coast out there in the mold he speaks of, when it's anything but that. Some of the people in the comments section were rightfully dismayed at this latest show of ideological drive, with one saying (to another):

It's not about hate, let's not go there, please. It's just that this is a character from a totally different era that showed no signs ever of swinging that way and Tynion decided he wants to "get with the times" and he completely changed him. Kind of like what Bendis did with Iceman, which was in even poorer taste. And like I said, it's just that DC did this in a very distasteful matter. They pretty much lied when people reacted badly to the whole Alan Scott from Earth-2 being gay, then prepared the way with Taylor's Injustice series, and eventually they got to what people actually feared would happen in the first place.

If this would've happened with a new, progressive character I guess there'd be no reactions. If, say, Punchline is lesbian or bisexual tomorrow no one will bat an eye, trust me. But when a writer decides that 80 years of history of a character is worth nothing solely because he wants to be acknowledged how progressive and woke he is, it does come off as disingenuous.

Correct. These obsessions have to come to an end. Especially the entitlement to classic creations owned by corporations, because that's what got us to this situation in the first place. Somebody else said:

With Alan, I'm bugged about it because his marriage, kids and relationships have always been a massive part of what made him the character he was - if memory serves, Jade and Obsidian are his kids with the Golden Age Rose/Thorn. Then there was his relationship with the Harlequin who eventually became his wife. But now all of this is him basically 'living a lie' for all those decades? For me it just doesn't ring true - it's a little disrespectful to the creators of those times and comes across as a bit opportunistic of Tynion and co at DC.

And this is why Tynion's actions are disrespectful to Finger, Nodell and Thomas. Tynion's another modern propagandist deconstructing past works and putting them back together in a way that doesn't remain true to the original material, let alone sound organic, and again, it's just a tired cliche by this point. Here's another comment:

I'd argue there's a paradox of diversity, so to speak. If every book/team is diverse, then is anything really diverse anymore? Aren't they all pretty much the same, judging by the "diversity" quota? I don't know if I'm making myself clear, I have the idea clear in my mind but maybe I'm not putting it into words how I'd like. Bottom line, if there's a DC team I feel shouldn't have to be confined to the diversity criteria, it's these guys. They're as old school as old school can get and I feel they were better that way. I'm not saying gay people didn't exist back then, repressed or not, I'm just saying that if you're looking to be as true as possible to the era JSA came from, Alan Scott was better off straight. Plus, there was something about him that was special, he was the first Green Lantern, the lantern without the connection to the power battery. Now, after this, most people, especially more young audiences, will know him as the "gay lantern". However I'm looking at it, it just doesn't add up.

I'd say this is another reason anybody who recognizes why it pays to respect the past avoid this rendition. Here's another:

I am a huge JSA fan. Been reading them for years. The All Star comics revival, All star squadron, infinity inc, the various crossovers and JSA series, even Alan's solo stories. I collected them all.

Alan's love for his wife was a big plot point in quite a few stories. He became young at one point and then mystically she did too. His relationship with Rose, Jade and Obsidian's mother, however was more of a sexual attraction and fling than a typical relationship. Alan was strongly sexually attracted to her. Molly, his wife, who he was also attracted to was the love of his life. He married her after his fling with Rose who ran off without Alan ever knowing she was pregnant. Now however it is implied he was never attracted to Rose and he cheated on Molly, the love of his life for decades.

I do believe DC wanted a gay character to boost sales. Tynion just chose who. I believe he lobbied for it. I could be wrong but that is the way it seems.

Obsidian as originally written was never gay. He had girlfriends in Infinity Inc. Obsidian was made gay by Gerard Jones in his Justice League run. (Gerard, btw, is currently in prison.) But for some reason it stuck, so now they want to make the father gay too as kind of a story point, which is also, strangely enough, saying homosexuality is genetic.

Obsidian hadn't been in much other than Infinity Inc when they made him gay, and it was pre-internet so no one really cared and if they did it was hard to tell.

As far as Netflix is concerned, it does indeed want diversity in its programs. It believed to be good marketing and profitable. As all things it comes down to money. DC wants more readers, Netflix more viewers. The one problem with randomly making a character gay and ignoring everything else written about them, is that you can't just undo it. It would create an uproar and negative press, unless of course you split him into Earth 2 Alan and original Alan.

Oh yeah, I have no doubt all the leftist SJWs would absolutely dogpile on these companies if they even dared dream of reversing the woke damage they're causing now. That's easily the worst thing about this; when they don't have the courage to climb off the high tree they're on. It practically symbolizes all that's wrong with corporate people in charge of publication that they're such cowards when it comes to SJW mobs and such, quite the opposite of the superheroes in the stories, who're supposed to be fearless. All that aside, it was wrong to retcon Obsidian, as the above-mentioned may have first done in the mid-90s, and all this pandering can't keep going on, as it's only writing the characters into very narrow corners. For now, if DC's coming to a close in publication, this is another reason why it can't come soon enough.

But what an astounding citation of a scribe we have here! Gerard Jones was responsible for Todd Rice's retcon? I know he became the main Justice League America writer in the last 2 years or so of the 1987-96 series published at the time (here's a page for issue 93 where Todd appears), and as easy as it might be to assume Jurgens was responsible, as I first did, I may have to look around in the future for material written by Jones to determine if he could've preceded Jurgens in any steps taken, whereupon, if it turns out Jones was the guilty party, I'll owe Jurgens at least half an apology (though given the political propaganda he's injected into his writings of recent, that's why it's hard to consider a full one). IIRC, Jade and Obsidian turned up in the 18th issue of GL vol.3 written by Jones in 1991, and I'll say this much: I'm disgusted with him for making any use of them after all the trouble he caused, just as much as I'm disgusted with the way he wrote Guy Gardner dumping Kari Limbo. I do remember that a character who first appeared in GL back in 1969, Olivia Reynolds, may have later been retconned as bisexual at the time Jones was on board the League titles, and considering what a bad lot Jones is, that's why that'll decidedly be something to disaprove of as well. For all we know, he may be more responsible for much of the negative effects stemming from the 90s than we think. Now, another reader comment:

Therein lies the problem. The fans who know these characters and are passionate about them protest and are dismissed (not saying you. You have been cordial and polite in this discussion) as out of touch, or racist, or homophobic. And the real criticism is ignored or brushed aside.

The new writers need to respect what came before them. Bendis is one of the worst in this respect. They shouldn't bend someone else's creation to fit your mold. If you can't write them correctly, don't use them. Make something new or use a character that has barely been used since the golden age, like Mr Scarlett. Or hell use a public domain character. There are literally 100s of golden age characters with no backstory that could be used for the purpose of Tynion's tale.

An important point made again about Bendis. His retcon to Iceman was one of the most loathsome things he ever did, and an insult to both Stan Lee and Jack Kirby. And then, here's an item by somebody who met Nodell:

I got to meet Martin Nodell in person -- I think it was at an Orlando MegaCon, maybe -- not long before he died, and we discussed the origins of his Green Lantern character, and I wondered if it had any origins in Diogenes carrying a lantern around in the daytime, facetiously "searching for an honest man". I seem to recall him saying it sounds like a good idea, but not necessarily agreeing that it was his inspiration for the character.

At any rate, I seriously have to wonder if he would've approved of what was done to his character after he died, and whether or not they deliberately waited until he was dead to do it.

And in response to that:

If he would still want work in the industry he'll have to approve. That's how it works these days. If not, he would get cancelled in two seconds. This is the world we live in.

This too is very perceptive: veterans today aren't allowed to defend how they originally crafted their characters. If Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster were the creators of Alan Scott, they'd be villified in 2 seconds flat if they dared raise any objections to what the higher DC echelons did to him. It'd be the same if Superman were the victim. That's how low the Orwellian wokeness atmosphere's sunk to.

In the end, it's terrible how Green Lantern's been sunk by so much political correctness ever since the end of the 80s, and this is just one more nail in the franchise's coffin. First, it was all petty complaints about Hal Jordan lacking fear, despite there being tons of superheroes, even at Marvel, who could be described the same way. Now, the problem is social justice pandering. And it all demonstrates what a sour note DC will end on.

Labels: dc comics, golden calf of LGBT, Green Lantern, history, Justice Society of America, moonbat writers, msm propaganda, politics, women of dc