Alan Scott: Green Lantern #2: Reading this issue during Pride Month definitely heightened the emotional impact of Alan struggling with his homosexuality as an inmate in Arkham Asylum's Deviancy Wing, where he and his fellow homosexuals undergo conversion therapy. (Oof, just writing that.)
That said, Alan is at Arkham more or less voluntarily. Alan's commanding officer realized the true nature of his relationship with Johnny given his despair over Johnny's death. Since Alan saved his ship's crew from the Crimson Flame, the Army allowed him to go to Arkham rather than dishonorably discharge him. As we saw last issue, Alan clearly does think something is wrong with him, so he's approaching his time in the Asylum as though it's a wellness retreat.
In the present, Alan meets Derby in an alley so he can recharge the Lantern. As they wait, Derby suggests to Alan that his knowledge of the victim's identity probably means he also knows the killer's identity. Derby encourages him to calm down a bit to give it all a good think and comments off-handedly that he could only find a pillowcase to hide the Lantern. The pillowcase proves to be the Proustian moment that prompts Alan to recall how he originally obtained the Lantern.
We return to Arkham, four years earlier, as Alan awakens screaming Johnny's name. Alan's roommate Billie comments on it; Billie's in Arkham since her family committed her once they realized she was trans. The pair head to their group therapy session, where the nurse tells Alan that his "sickness" is what made him think Johnny was the love of his life.
While the meeting happens, the attendees hear various screams from the hallway; someone begs for more time and another inmate screams, "Don't give me to them!" as orderlies drag him somewhere unknown. (When the inmate begs for his priest, since he knowns him better than anyone else, Billie quips, "I'll bet.") At dinner that night, Billie comments that the inmate was a man named Stephen: "It was Stephen. I'd know those wails anywhere. That queen is nothing if not dramatic." Ha! Team Billie. Alan comments that Dr. Freeman's procedure is "painless and nearly one hundred percent effective" so he doesn't know why Stephen was screaming.
Billie presents Alan a gift in a pillow case (hence the Proustian moment): the Green Lantern. According to Billie, the green metal was the first time he didn't get gray metal in the shop. Alan comments that he never told Billie he was a railway engineer and wonders how he knew to make him a train lantern. Billie says it just "spoke" to him. (Uh huh.) Billie thanks Alan for his friendship and the light it brought into his life but warns him the darkness will return. With the Lantern, he tells Alan that he'll have something to shine the light he possesses.
Billie then catches Alan cruising the "new corn-fed orderly," which Alan denies. Billie wishes that he'd accept there is nothing wrong with him, and Alan insists that "that part of [him]" is dead because he "watched it -him - die." He cruelly tells Billie that he's an old queen who missed his chance at a real life and that he plans on marrying the first girl he sees when he gets "fixed." Billie hilariously comments that he can then at least swap out his (i.e., Johnny's) terrible ring. Alan storms from the table, not noticing the orderlies coming for Billie.
That night, Alan writes in his journal that he knows it isn't healthy to wear Johnny's ring and that he's at the Asylum to get healthy. But he feels like they're doing it together when he's there, which is why he checked into Arkham as Alan Ladd-Scott. (Um, Alan obviously not getting the cognitive dissonance there.) Suddenly, the Lantern activates and says, "We bring lllife!"
Later, Alan is concerned when Billie doesn't return to their room for several days. Alan is desperate to apologize, but, when he finds Billie again, she appears dressed as a man in a wheelchair and with a head bandage, confirming that Dr. Freeman's "procedure" is lobotomies. Alan recalls the Crimson Flame said, "We bring death" in a voice similar to, but different from, the Green Light's. He observes that he belongs in the Asylum if he's hearing voices, but Billie didn't belong there as she simply was who she was. However, her doctors and family told her every day "she was sick and wrong," so she was sentenced to death. Alan observes that, the more he loses his mind, the more things make sense, a sign that he's coming to accept who he is.
With this new approach, Alan commits to helping everyone escape, but Dr. Freeman appears before he can do so, having found his journal. Quoting the line, "...the way God made me," Freeman dismisses it as "disgusting filth" and has Alan committed, sending him to E.C.T. Accepting that the patients weren't wrong but the Asylum's unwillingness to treat them as human beings was, Alan and the hot orderly help everyone escape.
Alan and a bunch of the guys head to Colorado where someone has a "sympathetic cousin." Given the era, Alan finds a job as an honest railway engineer, "even one with a blue ticket and a voice in his head." Alan is having sex with a hot guy named Jimmy (who looks like a younger and even hotter Johnny), and Jimmy warns him that they need to be careful because Alan's business nemesis, Albert Dekkers, is gunning for him. In a sign of his progress, Alan tells him that they need to be themselves. Meanwhile, Jimmy then tells Alan that it's OK if he reminds him of Johnny.
Echoing "Earth 2" #1, Dekkers engineers blowing up the bridge that Alan and Jimmy's train is crossing. As Jimmy is kissing Alan's neck, Alan notices the Lantern glow and comments, "This isn't right." Mistaking his meaning, Jimmy tells Alan that they don't have to live in the shadows anymore. At that point, the bridge explodes. Alan and the other 41 passengers, including Jimmy, are fatally wounded. Before he dies, Alan hears, "We bring deathh...", and then, "...then liiife", as the text bubble turns from red to green.
In the present, Alan tells Derby that he and Johnny read about the Emerald Flame of Life when researching the Crimson Flame and wonders if the Green Light wasn't drawn to him due to his encounter with the Crimson Flame. Alan then exposits that the bank robber from last issue who appeared to be Johnny - given he died from burning and drowning - was actually the orderly, Robbie. Apparently, after they all escape, Alan dated Robbie for a while, which the Crimson Lantern (if we're calling him that) clearly knew. Alan departs to find the Crimson Lantern who we see hovering over the docks.
Looking over the issue, Sheridan does a really great job of giving us a script showing Alan dealing with conflicting emotions. It's hard to nail that landing in comics, as you don't have a lot of room to tease out motivations, particularly ones at odds with each other. But Sheridan does it beautifully here, particularly since he doesn't present Alan as fully healed in one issue. Alan clearly still struggles with his sexuality; he's just at a better place after his experience at Arkham than he was. It really makes me look forward to the rest of this series and Alan's journey to self-acceptance (one day).
Local Man #7: This issue is great. Honestly, I was meh on continuing with this title, but the creative team really hits a home run here.
At Chief Bucholz's request, Jack heads into the forest to meet the Star Tribe. As Jack walks along a river, two phantasmic hands grab him and pull him into the water. Two figures then appear above the water and try to grab him, but Jack uses his powers to hit them with two billiard balls that he had on hand.
He awakens in the "House of Hearts," where a white dude with dreads, a joint, and an open robe asks him why he attacked his friends. (We see them on the room's side, with bandages.) The dude explains they were trying to help and reveals that he knows Jack is Crossjack. The dude hands Jack some tea and tells him that he's in the Star Tribe's embrace, here "in the people's woods to pray for the soul of America." He introduces himself as Coochie Poo, and we get our first view of the hearts on Coochie's chest. When Jack asks about them, Coochie explains a heart appears for every person he loved when the lover leaves. He comments, "Once my flesh is covered, I think I'll just float up to heaven."
Jack says he's looking for Mackenzie, reminding us that she drowned on dry land. He asks if the Tribe ever accepted in a child murderer, and Coochie redirects. He tells Jack that his power isn't just that he can hit stuff: his power tells him when something's right. In fact, Coochie opines that Jack knows that something isn't right about Chief Buckholz, and we see a flashback where the Chief tells Jack he'll arrest him if he looks into anything other than the hippies. Telling Jack that his power wants him to find justice his own way, Coochie hugs him and sends him on his way.
After Jack leaves, Coochie's "friends" are amazed that he's a sooper, but Coochie - now speaking in a normal word bubble and not a wavy one like he previously did - tells him that he isn't. The hearts are for "every body whose ass I ate at Coachella 2012." Ha! Apparently they served "that narc a heroic dose of psilocybin."
Jack wanders a bit and we get some amazing images of his drug-fueled journey, like when he grabs his own word bubble! He runs into an imaginary wall and gets a text from Inga asking what he's doing. Inga tells him the kids are sleeping and Brian is at the station and sends him a photo of her asshole.
At Inga's house, we see she actually sent Jack a photo of a pink-frosted donut, and Jack sent her a dick pic. (Let's just say, it isn't heroically sized.) Inga's daughter awakens and complains that Inga's been acting weird all night. Inga hugs her and tells her she's just dealing with pressure, and - I missed it the first time - the same hands that tried to drown Jack appear from the sink. Inga snaps a look, but they're gone.
Jack visits a kid named Craig Massen, because his photo was on the Future Forum poster with Mackenzie's. He asks about Mackenzie, and Craig confesses that he drove Mackenzie to the woods after she heard a song (like Jack did). She's apparently heard voices before, and he hoped that, if her parents learned she was hearing them again, he'd replace her as Inga's favorite. (Uh-oh.) He cries, telling Jack that his mom's in rehab and his dad is a drunk, and Jack tells him to drive him to where he left off Mackenzie but hands him Pepper to comfort him first. (Well played, Jack.)
Jack heads to where Craig directs him and runs into an invisible wall again, this time showing him a pipe with overflow drainage. Contemplating his powers, he hurls a billiard ball, figuring his power to answer questions will lead him where it should. It does...to Inga's storage unit. Inside, he finds the water, though he identifies it more as tallow. We then see all the test tubes containing Fourth Gen are smashed. I don't think we saw anyone smash them previously, so I wonder if Inga knows. Obviously, though, the liquid or tallow seeped into the forest and, I'm guessing, created the creature with the hands we've seen.
Meanwhile, Inga is burning a fire in a pit and sees Jack via security cameras enter the storage unit. Brian arrives, telling her they have to talk about Mackenzie. We then see her crying while the camera, if you will, focuses on the wood in the fire, which is Inga's bakery sign. In the facility, Jack looks into the tubes, and we see Seascape's decimated corpse.
In other words, shit's going to go down, you all.
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