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Keeping an Ion Things

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Ion #12
“Burying the Past”
Writer: Ron Marz
Artist: Fernando Pasarin
Colors: Richard & Tanya Horie
Letters: Rob Leigh
Cover artist: Kalman Andrasofszky
Editor: Eddie Berganza
Publisher: DC Comics
Price: $2.99 US/$3.65

I admit it… I got sucked in. The cover for this issue, which serves as the concluding chapter of this limited series, as well as the first page, drew me into a comic book that I figured would focus on characterization above cosmic action. That didn’t prove to be the case. But hey, that’s OK, as I enjoy well-crafted cosmic action as well. But that’s not to be found in this comic book either. In fact, I really don’t see the makings of any kind of plot here at all. No epic is brought to a close. The title character seems to make no changes or advances in his life, super or otherwise. As far as I can tell, Ion isn’t really about Kyle Rayner or any kind of space-faring adventure. Instead, I was left with the impression that it was nothing but an exercise in teasing and setting up DC’s next crossover event book, which is rumored to be about the return of parallel universes to DC continuity.

Ion, AKA Green Lantern Kyle Rayner, has a deadly encounter with Grayven in deep space and avoids an untimely death thanks to the intervention of his one-time girlfriend, Donna Troy. Kyle has weightier concerns on his mind than Grayven’s motives (and the mysterious appearance of one of the Monitors), as he rushes back to Earth because of a garbled message about his mother. In a hospital room surrounded by his friends, Kyle is distraught to learn that another woman in his life has died. This time, though, he’s determined to do something about it.

Artist Fernando Pasarin capably handles the art chores on this super-hero story, and his style reminds me a little of the work of Jamal (Firestorm) Igle. Still, there’s not a single visual in this issue that really grabbed me, and the subject matter offers chances for some dynamic (if goofy) visuals. The cosmic heroes and villains — from Ion to the Monitor — really lack any real sense of presence or grandeur, and they don’t even look that exotic in appearance. The hospital-room scene is a little bit stronger actually, but Kyle’s mother really isn’t portrayed as being old enough to have a son Kyle’s age.

Where the book shines from a visual standpoint is in the colors. Richard and Tanya Horie bring a level of energy to the book that really pops, and given the bland linework, it’s a big boost to the book. I love the subtle green auras they create not only for a key character later in the book, but for Ion’s word balloons. That creates the impression of something alien or even divine in the character.

By the end of the issue, the point of the story seems to be for Ion to learn a lesson that Hal Jordan only learned about going insane, killing, dying and returning to life: that he isn’t God despite possessing seemingly limitless power. It makes for a decent, character-based conclusion, but there are problems with it. The scene is a cliched one; we’ve seen this time and time again in the past. Furthermore, this is a lesson that Kyle has already learned in the past (when he first became Ion in Green Lantern a few years ago). The scene lacks any real tension because we know how it’s going to play out as well.

The focus of this issue — and of some previous issues — seems to be on a story that has yet to be told. The Monitor’s appearance here and Kyle’s previous encounters with DC characters from other realities are all designed to get the reader excited about the inevitable followup to DC’s recent Infinite Crisis crossover event. I’m not sure if that’ll prove to be the May-debuting Countdown or some other limited series yet to be named. In any case, it’s incredibly frustrating. I don’t begrudge DC the need or inclination to get some buzz going about another storyline, but the publishers seems to have done so to the detriment of any semblance of a plot for Ion.

Save for the death of a rarely-seen supporting character in this issue, nothing seems to have changed since the first issue of the series. Readers will no doubt wonder what the point of the exercise was. I’d have to say the answer is marketing when it should have been storytelling. 3/10

March 26, 2007 Don MacPherson

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11 thoughts on “Keeping an Ion Things”

  1. Palladin says:
    March 26, 2007 at 11:02 pm

    It disappointed me as well. It did seem to just lose some steam after a fairly good build up to something more. Here are the thoughts from my Blog;

    http://comicbookchristian.blogspot.com/2007/03/commentary-ion-guardian-of-universe-12.html

    I read the entire series and felt this way.

  2. The Mighty Rob! says:
    March 27, 2007 at 8:14 am

    I was ultra-disappointed in this issue and overall on the whole series. I have followed Kyle since his introduction way back in GL #48 and have been a huge Pro-Kyle fan ever since, so I was really looking forward to seeing Kyle in his own series again but it’s such a shame that it never really delivered.

    The entire ION series shows too many unanswered subplots, I never really felt as though I was getting the whole story and by the end of the issue you wonder if the whole ION story was nothing but one huge 12-monthly advert for the upcoming SINESTRO CORPS SPECIAL, something that I’m not really all that interested in.

    I had high hopes for ION, as I thought Kyle was the best Green Lantern and loved his character in JLA, but since his change to ION I feel that DC don’t really know what to with him, heck, not even Ron Marz knows what to do with him anymore.

  3. Don MacPherson says:
    March 27, 2007 at 10:05 am

    Rob wrote:
    I had high hopes for ION, as I thought Kyle was the best Green Lantern and loved his character in JLA, but since his change to ION I feel that DC don’t really know what to with him, heck, not even Ron Marz knows what to do with him anymore.

    That’s a valid point. Since Hal Jordan’s return, Kyle doesn’t really seem to have a place in DC’s pantheon of heroes, and understandably so.

  4. Sven says:
    March 27, 2007 at 11:33 am

    It’s actually kind of upsetting – DC had a really good core of early adult heroes in the late 90s – Nightwing, Wally, Kyle, Connor, etc. – and they haven’t really done right by any of them, with Dick and Kyle getting the worst treatment of the bunch despite having the books with the best sales records. Kyle, in particular, was consistently the most entertaining GL no matter where he appeared (JLA, his own title) or who wrote him*, and has been rewarded with a punt into obscurity while the boring Hal stories continue.

    (For crying out loud, Hal’s even the focus of the JLA now; little surprise it’s been so underwhelming.)

    * – We’ll agree to ignore Ben Rabb’s tanking of GL.

    That said: Winick actually explained why Kyle’s mom looks so young during his GL stint. It’s actually a good gag buried within one of my favourite issues of that stretch, the one dealing with Kyle’s high school reunion.

  5. JohnnyZito says:
    March 27, 2007 at 1:21 pm

    @ Sven
    DC had a really good core of early adult heroes in the late 90s – Nightwing, Wally, Kyle, Connor, etc. – and they haven’t really done right by any of them

    I remember a Wizard article from around then about DC’s new legacy characters. Nightwing was selling well, Conner was in the JLA and Kyle had the charm of being the only Green Lantern left in the Universe.

    It might not have been the DCU we were used to but it was certainly positive progression. Since then a lot has been undone and guys like Connor, Kyle and Dick get side stepped for their predecessors.

  6. The Mighty Rob! says:
    March 27, 2007 at 1:24 pm

    I agree with Sven.

    At a time in the 90’s when Spiderman was being decimated by it’s extremely overlong and tired Clone Saga, I felt that the Kyle Rayner GL series was DC’s alternative. Kyle humour mirrored that of Peter Parker and his personal life and friends had some interesting sub-plots. I think Marz even claimed that he set out to write Kyle Rayner as DC’s version of Peter Parker – and if not for all the Jordan fanboys asking for DC to take the fun out of Green Lantern then we would have discovered more about to like about Kyle.

    I expected ION to carry on that tradition of the old 90’s style Lantern story. Instead, we get no real answers, no real story and not even a real ending!

  7. Don MacPherson says:
    March 27, 2007 at 2:50 pm

    Johnny wrote:
    I remember a Wizard article from around then about DC’s new legacy characters. Nightwing was selling well, Conner was in the JLA and Kyle had the charm of being the only Green Lantern left in the Universe.
    It might not have been the DCU we were used to but it was certainly positive progression. Since then a lot has been undone and guys like Connor, Kyle and Dick get side stepped for their predecessors.

    Bear in mind DC has adopted a different philosophy to its mythbuilding storytelling. Now, we’re looking at the return of the multiverse, at the emphasis of legacy heroes. DC doesn’t want a single GL anymore, it wants the GL Corps. And a Sinestro Corps. And Supergirl, Super-Zod Child and more members added to the Batman Family.

  8. Palladin says:
    March 27, 2007 at 4:30 pm

    I liked Ben Raab’s run on the book. It was Winnik that left me underwhelmed. I stopped reading after his first four issues. Then came back when Raab started writing. The end of Kyle was on the wall then, so those stories were not meant to be the continuation of the character.

  9. Nick MB says:
    April 3, 2007 at 3:08 am

    I’ve always wondered… Was Hal brought back because of fan demand? It seemed like the bulk of the fans moaning about Kyle had kinda died off by the turn of the century and they’d resigned themselves to Hal being the Spectre.
    To me, the return of Hal was more a consequence of:
    a) Kyle’s solo title floundering.
    b) Geoff Johns becoming more prominant at DC and being a large Hal fan.

  10. Dan Coyle says:
    April 6, 2007 at 12:54 pm

    People often forget that Kyle Rayner was brought forth because Jordan’s own solo title was crashing badly, thanks to dull, unpleasant scripting by Gerard Jones.

  11. Luis Dantas says:
    April 18, 2007 at 8:52 am

    Hal’s book was in trouble back then, that is correct. I was actually excited by the idea of a new GL when I first heard about GL #51.

    But Kyle Rayner was as serious a misfit to the GL concept as one could think of. He is a Firestorm kind of concept, not a GL.

    As for Hal as Spectre, I don’t remember a single person who was satisfied by that status quo. Actually, I don’t think anyone even considered it as something meant to last, and rightly so.

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