While it wouldn't have solved the story's other problems... the stupid retcon would make far more sense if those old rules ONLY worked for Relic's universe. Think about it, whatever power that hand is had decided the emotional spectrum needed to be more self-sustaining and renewable so it tied that function to the color beings, as well as decoupling it from reality-fueling duties. Relic's motivation and the tragedy of his universe remains, but his attempts to apply the same logic to this new universe are fatally misguided and we don't end up completely screwing over the existing lore.
Brilliant! Magnificat! With this one comment, you have proposed a solution that would have fixed everything about Relic. I am disappointed that this is not what was done. You, good sir, are a genius and I wish DC had your logic.
I kinda want to see the issue redone now, focusing more upon the effects of the various lights being extinguished. A skilled writer could take the loss of hope, loss of compassion, loss of fear, and such, and depict interesting changes to that society. Also, perhaps characterize them as "drives" rather than "emotions" so that will fits better into the scheme.
I'm upset that the Star Sapphire origin alien wasn't scantily glad. *banging fist on table* I demand equally awkward looking costumes for all species and genders, damn it!
the best thing about all those green lantern villian 1 shots were that Hal Jordan ALWAYS was bond to an asteroid on the cover. ALWAYS. Even Sinestro made it.
My head canon for this is that in all actuality Relic has a vendetta against light smiths, and blamed the destruction of the universe on them, while intentionally destroying it himself. This story isn't what actually happened, it's what Relic claimed happened
I like to image that the universe just occasionally resets and the light going away was a process of the universal reset that would occur regardless of the lightsmith's actions, and that he is just suffering some confirmation bias.
Love how Linkara goes on a rant about how we're focusing more on the villains than heroes when the promotion for Arkham Knights on the back says "Your Enemies Will Define You." Also, a scientist preaching about how the universe is running out of energy, who travels to the end of the universe as it crumbles around him, only to be absorbed and converted into a new, god-like form which then tries to kill everybody? Did DC just introduce Galactus into their comics...?
If I was working on the Green Lantern comics, I could figure out how to make this whole thing work without ignoring it. Relic and several lanterns encounter a Guardian of the Well and we learn that indeed the Well did destroy the universe Relic came from, but not because it was drained as previously believed. It was because the Well was being MOVED. The Well itself does not run out of energy. The Guardian moved the Well and because Relic's universe was leaching on it so much (i.e. They used it to create cities that stand 24/7) it resulted in that universe's destruction.
Robo - Nidai or maybe it was how his universe worked but this one has the creatures and central batteries to recharge the universe. And atoms don't get to feel anymore
Did the old universe have controversies about where to drill for emotional energy? Was there ever a light- spill caused by poor decision making? Was there concern about polluting the environment with light?
I realize you're joking but how does One More Day tie into Countdown? I would actually be very impressed if you could find a path from one to the other.
+shadowspider9 Superboy Prime is from Earth Prime aka our world/the real world. So it would be logical to assume that on Earth Prime, Marvel Comics are printed and read, with all that entails to. Superboy Prime's shattering of reality in Infinite Crisis was an event of such stupid proportions, that the stupid resonated all the way to Earth Prime and changed Joe Quesada's continuity into believing that superheroes like Spider-Man should not be married.
I've always preferred heroes over villains, but I've also found Earth-3 to be a very fascinating concept. A mirror universe where concepts like kindness, justice, and humility are literally alien concepts to the inhabitants. ...also, there are 6 fingers on that hand @ 7:16
Ok, this is an old episode and nobody's going to read this but screw it. The reason people often care more about villains is because they're often allowed to be more complex or flawed. The thing is, making a character likeable or "relatable" isn't necessarily going to produce a super nuanced or interesting character, and people's perceptions of what a hero should be often restricts them in ways that villains aren't subject to. If you look at a lot of the most acclaimed characters in literature, even before comic books took off, like say, Heathcliff from Wuthering Heights, they are often not very good or nice people and in fact have VERY serious character flaws or may do cruel or horrible things that the audience doesn't agree with. But it doesn't really matter at all and in fact those aspects just make them MORE interesting. You can also see a good example of this in Watchmen. Out of all of the characters, not that many of them are exactly great people. The nicest ones are probably Owlman II and Silk Spectre but they're not exactly as interesting compared to The Comedian, Ozymandias, Dr. Manhattan or Rorschach. Basically with a villain or a character who can be allowed to be unlikable in some ways you have access to a broader palette of the human experience and the potential to create a more complex character. With that said I would agree that the way DC has been treating their villains by upping the edge or making them godlike is dumb, but I see that as a bit of a separate issue.
I agree. For a quick non-comics example, which character do people like more, the sarcastic drug addict manipulative jerk Dr. House, or the caring friendly nice guy Dr. Wilson?
That's not always a good thing. Not only with how DC has been going about things but with fans more than willing to overlook the horrible things a villain has done just because they find them more "interesting" than the heroes. There's a trope for that too, called "Draco in Leather Pants."
I think there is also another more simple solution sometimes a villain is just entertaining with how dastardly he or she is, aka the "love to hate" trope Take for example one of my favorite Villains Yuki Terumi from Blazblue. now to start of with, Terumi is by no means a good person or even sympathetic he is a gigaintic royal grade A dick head, to the point that almost every member of the Blazblue cast has it out for him (which tbh is what he wants as he gets stronger by feeding of Misery hate and emotion) the reason why the fans find him so entertaining? because he owns *every. Scene. in the game!* seriously whenever Terumi is on screen you can't help but get enthralled in his actions because he as a villain is always looking like he's having the time of his life. This in turn is also what makes seeing him finally get whats coming to him so satisfying, because when the chips are down and they are backed into a corner, suddenly that smug aura vanishes. this doesn't just apply to Terumi either: Hades from Kid Icarus uprising Junko from Danganronpa Handsome Jack from Borderlands Kano from Mortal Kombat and yes even our old pal the Joker However, what can make these guys and gal's even more entertaining is when they are a smug son of a bitch, but when they need to get serious, they put on their game face and you realize how these guys got so dangerous. its Like whenever the Joker stops laughing and starts talking in a low voice, the first thought that goes through your mind is "oooooh crap", drawing on another trope: *beware the silly ones*
I love villains more than the next person but I think the heroes get overlooked too much. There is a reason why people look up to heroes like Superman. They give us hope and inspire us to di goid in the world. However there are people who think Superman is boring and not interesting but they fail to rally exam him. Superman does not see himself as a god. He just wants to use his power to protect the innocent and nake the world a better place. Superman vs the Elite did a fantastic job examining Supernan and why he still fights for good and why people like Black cause more problems in the long run. Yes Black is entertaining but he is also an narcissistic sociopath who would crush a city just to prove a point if he wanted to. Might does not always make right. Sherlock Holmes is another example of a hero who is viewed as "boring" but is far more complex when you examine him more. He may not always be the nicest bloke but he will always do the right thing avd yses his great intellect to solve crimes and bring criminals to justice. Point is, villains may be cool but in of the day, we still root for someone like Supernan to defeat them. And considering the state of the world right now, we need heroes more than villains.
My theory is that people's love of villains is tied to the fact that the best of them deeply want something. I used to think at only villains could be compelling and heroes were all boring, but since then I've discovered a handful of heroes with very strong desires and motivation who all now some of my favorite characters of all time.
So, the last universe he was in didn't listen, so he started punching stuff until they would. Sounds like a certain lord I know, who conquers all he sees.
@@davidspring4003 When you're greedy, you fear other people taking your stuff and become angry if they do. Hope going into love should be obvious, but think of how often love is described as "fierce" or "burning", just like anger. One of the more famous Red Lanterns, Dex-Starr, unlocked his rage because his love was stolen from him.
Except that colors works way different when it comes to light XD Green is one of the primary colors, coupled with red and blue (hence, RGB), while yellow is the result of green + red. All of them mixed together make white, which can be decomposed back into them (and btw that's how rainbows are created) , just like that Pink Floyd album cover. But it's just a nitpick, of course, not to bash you or anything.
So after giving it some thought, I realized how easily you could fix the story without needing to change anything but the text boxes/dialogue. First, change the problem with the emotion spectrum wells. Instead of having it be a source which can be depleted, make the problem that over time, exposure to the raw power of the well’s energy begins to affect the user’s minds. Corrupting them and eventually leading to the war between the light smiths (which is what destroys the old universe). Second, instead of relic getting his ideas laughed off for not having enough evidence, have it be that he discovers the truth too late and all the light smiths have already been corrupted. Thus, you can make relic’s motivation be that he feels guilty for not figuring out the problem in time to save the others. And to explain his more villainous actions, have it be revealed as he’s entering the new universe, that he too was affected by the emotional spectrum’s power while doing his research. This would give relic a more sympathetic backstory and make him more of a tragic villain than a arrogant moron. Plus, you wouldn’t end up screwing with the previously established continuity as much. And lastly, instead of having the lanterns be afraid of running out of power, have them be afraid of the possibility that over using their rings/lanterns could start screwing with their minds. That way, the problem is easier to fix and you don’t write yourself into a corner. Granted, that might not make for a great story, but it’d probably make for a better one than we actually got.
So the Lightsmiths, in order to prevent their light-powers from running out, began fighting each other for control of the light and inevitably destroyed there entire universe? That sounds like the backstory of the Kingdom Hearts series.
16:08 Dear lord, it's Bill Cypher! He really has always been here! Alright, he got a paint job and a new hat between then and now, but it's totally him!
So... Instead of say, having the light reservoir start out being tapped by people using various emotions, and then in the end, having certain people from the old world become the Emotional Avatars, they instead have no explanation for them, say it is existence but never explain why it is tapped by emotions, and just have Relic survive by going into the Source Wall.
19:00 "They said he was a relic, accusing him of wanting to return to a less enlightened time." So, yeah, it was a nickname that was appropriated. His original name is not stated in the series. Also, just to be fair, being entirely made of splash pages isn't a crime in and of itself. The Death of Superman was also entirely splash pages. In this case, it's just not handled nearly as well. Admittedly, I enjoyed Lights Out as a whole. Yeah, I noticed some of what you mentioned in this particular issue, but binge reading the trade made it seem less standoffish especially because it appeared AFTER Relic attacks the blue lantern planet. I guess a big difference for me is that I've only just started getting into the Green Lantern stories (I have a LOT of back tracking to do) so I naturally didn't notice the retcons/continuity problems involved. Yeah, the environmental PSA was very obvious, but overall I thought it was a well put together story.
I mean, even if you don't understand the continuity problems, you have to wonder how the Lanterns were draining the universe when it would have taken all the corps put together a monstrous amount of effort and time to match the energy output of what a single star can do over the course of a few seconds, because, like... even Mogo is incredibly small next to the sheer ridiculous outputs that stars put out. Like, how does that all work? Logistically? Even that whole "entire societies run on light with no physical constructions" should logically barely be even a writeoff of a lowball estimate of a percent of a fraction of another percent of another fraction of the amount of energy being generated, in that universe, at the exact same time, by like two stars of millions.
I believe part of the reason people are so interested in villains is that many times they drive the story. All stories revolve around conflict (man vs man, man vs nature, man vs self, man vs society). The more interesting the villain our hero is fighting, the more interesting the conflict, the more interesting the story. Though I will admit villain fans can go too far to the point of almost idolizing the villains. Sadly this can pour over into real life, with serial killers or the surviving Boston Bomber having fan girls.
I love seeing stories focusing on villains. A fascination with characters, really. I don't care if it's a villain or a hero, but since writers hate to put their heroes on true journeys with true struggles, I look to villains.
As an answer to why the "emotional well" idea doesn't work: it wasn't meant to. It was supposed to just work off of and individual's emotion, not some stupid source wall that takes the entire point of the lanterns away. The book right after Geoff Johns left just took everything that had been built up and said "screw it, lets add artificial depth where there doesn't need to be any"
I agree, this whole fixation on the villains has been taken too far, especially with the routes that they've taken with the villains like with the Joker. Personally, that's one of the reasons I like the Marvel movies a lot. The focus more on the heroes, the heroes journey and their struggles. Captain America, Guardians of the Galaxy, Iron Man, etc all focus more on the heroes than letting the villains steal the show. It's good to have fascinating and interesting villains, but not when it overshadows the heroes. We read superhero comics primarily to see the heroes save the day.
Marvel movies are often criticized for subpar villains, but they're not needed for the kind of movies Marvel makes. Their stories are all focused on the hero's internal struggle, which explains their preference for Doppelganger-style villains that have similar abilities to the hero; they let the hero fight a version of themselves that made all the bad decisions or a representation of their own flaws.
I like focus on villains when its done WELL. When its about focusing on their backstories, personalities and about telling tragic and meaningful tales instead of gritty edginess. Think Killing Joke instead of Death of the Family.
You know Relics origin is some what similar to Galactus. A scientist from a universe before our universe began and when they entered our universe they became a giant. That's where the similarities end but there origin is more or less the same.
The willpower thing is slightly dumb, but I find the whole "instilling fear" aspect of the Yellow lanterns even more confusing. First off, that's a really complicated power source if you need to get fear from somebody else.. and second, I've seen the Yellow lanterns portrayed as drawing on fear from the user a whole bunch of times, like in Blackest Night when Scarecrow was all excited that he was able to feel fear again. And really, it would just be a lot more interesting if Yellow Lanterns' power came from their own fears--I would love to see a Sinestro where he was characterized as lashing out because of all of his insecurities and fears, and the ring was amplifying this. It's more believable too, because Sinestro looks way too dopey to be actually scary.
I think the whole "instilling fear" part is a thing because the original Sinestro rings were made in the antimatter universe (whatever we're calling it this week) and therefore are contractually obligated to work on inverted logic - hence, working off the emotions of those OTHER than the user, when positive-matter rings generally don't. I assume the cases of Sinestro Corps members using their own fear for power are a combination of this lore detail being forgotten and changes to how the rings are configured now that there's a whole Corps instead of just one guy with a yellow ring.
It sounds like the mythos story in the Kingdom Hearts series, specifically the one told to Kairi when she still lived in Radiant Garden. Only this time, its rings instead of keyblades.
I've seen almost all your videos so many times, and I can't help but find myself drawn to always rewatching them your contents just that good! Keep up the absolute top notch quality videos Linkara your an absolute treat and I'm so glad I've found your channel you certainly bring nothing but joy! Love you man, I don't ever want to see you stop, but at the same time I wouldn't ever want to see you do this if your heart wasn't in it, think it's great eventhough your a comic book channel you don't just stick to Marvel and DC like everyone else. I'm thinking of requesting for a patron review but would it be anytime soon or is they're a waiting list or something? Also I really enjoy your theme song but I absolutely adore your end credits song and always watch your videos to the end. Just gorgeous music I hope you have a wonderful Christmas Lewis, and can't wait to see more stuff, started watching your channel because of Doug but I started with Longbox of the Damned being a huge horror fan binged all them in a few days a year or two back and can't stand the wait! But guess it's worth it. Point being I obviously could go all day about how much happiness you've given my life. So I'll stop now but thank you Lewis.
this particular story was one I actually read in a comics store a while back, it sort of gave me an idea in my own writing, different facets of space and time that can be manipulated by beings utalizing emotions (not unlike the lanterns) but its more like magic, and a single person can use abilities belonging to all emotions sort of like the phantom ring, accept the characters control their powers with a literal stone embedded in their hearts, things like Rage giving the ability to either super heat items, or super cool them through fun with thermal dynamics, compasion allowing gravitational manipulation, fear allowing an anti-magnetic like repulsion ability (depending on how scared the user was it would push people back from them more Resolve, allows for powerful mater manipulation, ect. because these abilities did tie into the functions of the universe the more they used there abilities, the sooner the end of the universe would happen (it would take several hundreds of thousands of generations to kill the universe though) but eventually the end comes, and the universe recycles itself, starting a gain, from square one, think of it like big bang following after a big crunch
Lewis's comment about the MCU's (at the time) lackluster villains is amusing in hindsight when the next few years gave us Vulture, Ego, Mysterio, and most especially Thanos. That's right; THE MCU BOWS TO THE WHIMS OF LINKARA!
Villains are very important to any story, but they shouldn't be more interesting or important than the hero. What's worse is when people pretend the villains are heroic in their own right; the Draco in Leather Pants effect (Doug Walker did a video on Loki as an example). Good villains contrast the hero: a good comparison would be Khan and Kirk, or Anakin and Luke: they are similar in a lot of ways, but they make different decisions when faced with the same situations, with the heroes making the right decision. The villain exists to make the heroes' struggle more compelling and to make the hero's triumph more important. It's my opinion that a villain's defeat should mirror their character-falling off a cliff because they insisted on stabbing the hero in the back, getting destroyed by the power they fought so hard to possess, being destroyed by another villain had their own agenda, etc. Even if we go back to the Bronze Age, we have tragic villains like King Saul or Hector of Troy, but their deaths and defeats are just as important as their characters, and again contrast with their adversaries. From Ahriman to the Joker, the villain is an evil counterpart of the hero. When in comes to Supervillains, I really think Batman and the X-men (and a lesser extent Superman and Spiderman) are among the very few with striking villains. Mike Keesay, a Godzilla fan, made the point that Gamera, unlike Godzilla, isn't as interesting as his villains, and so isn't as successful or memorable. And Suicide Squad was just stupid in all incarnations I enjoy villains because they provide contrast, and allow the audience to shift perspectives and let their dark side come out. Think of how many Khan, Joker, and Vader quotes there are-their pride and sadism is horrific, but it's memorable and in its own way amusing, right up to their defeats. Think about Team Fourstar: Vegeta and Nappa, then Frieza and Cell steal the show because while they're dangerous, they still get a lot of jokes, and even their defeats are made hilarious and tremendously satisfying. There's something about fear, awe, and revulsion that goes together with humor, appreciation, and envy. I can't place my finger on it.
DC's problem is that they don't get that the villain is boring without the hero to bounce off of. Evil winning is a scary possibility that should be real in the storyline buuuut if that's the premise then why should we care? I have the same problem with a lot of dystopian literature for the same problem: if the protagonist can't do something significant, reverse the odds, it's pointless. Despite what some idiots said, Rogue One would have been far less effective if it had ended with the shot of Vader rather than Leia. The villain shouldn't be defeated right away, of course-losing the character means losing the ability to tell stories with them; hence my annoyance with My Little Pony's trend of making villains turn face every single season or being defeated in a single episode, but if the villain wins in the end, it's basically cheating the audience. Remember that show Phelan reviewed, Mortal Kombat Conquest? The final episode had Khan (no, the other Khan) sending in some anonymous flunkies that go kill every other character in the series. I hope you've enjoyed no moral theater! Or take that idiotic The Culling event-so a major character was introduced just to be killed, the event stretched forever, with dozens of characters...and nothing was accomplished with the villain not even admitting defeat. Or Cry For Justice, where Prometheus killed dozens of supporting characters (a variation on Women in Refrigerators), defeated almost every character, and is unceremoniously shot in the very last panel. The villain's triumph should be balanced by their defeat-that's basic storytelling!
From what I saw here, I think the idea of the reservoir isn't that the energy is limited in a cosmic sense - it will always be there, and was there when the universe remade itself - but rather that it's limit in a _practical_ sense - in that you can only safely use so much of it at any given time. I can see why this would be attractive for creators: it would fit the original ideas of the ebb and flow of the power, and put more focus on the lanterns ( the characters)themselves, rather than the rings. Of course, that all assumes careful storycrafting on the part of DC, which I infer from your statements was not present.
I think the reason so many people, mainly older readers, have become so interested in villains is because villains justify people's view that the world is dark and horrible and they empathize with how the world screwed them over. It's the same reason I think Batman has become so popular over the last decade. Because Batman perpetrates that the world is a dark and gritty place. It's kind of depressing honestly because when things get bad what's really needed is heroes who give people hope the world can be better.
+shadowspider9 and it's these people that make villain monthly titles happen....Villain books cannot work eventually it turns into torture porn and that's disgusting
it is depressing and it's why so many people play and enjoy Grand Theft Auto because they enjoy living out their dark fantasies that they can just blow away their boss or annoying family members without any consequences whatsoever people hate upstanding goody two shoes squeaky clean heroes because they see them as too bland and generic...always having to shove some PSA down our throats and yet those same people will be rooting and hollering for Protagonists out of Breaking Bad because it's so dark gritty and realistic...they think anyone whose positive doesn't have a real life and doesn't understand how hard it is to play by the rules and be a moral upstanding citizen
+shadowspider9 Really I love villains a lot cause they teach me the world isn't dark. When even a monster has that little spark of kindness I attach to them more. Take Beast Wars Megatron, he was evil and wanted to kill all man kind but seeing him take a bath with a rubber ducky showed me as a little kid hey even monsters need baths and toys. Then a thought hey wait he's only a badguy cause the old Megatron lost a war and his people kept saying we could have won, course he's going to go bad he wants a better life. A life lesson I hold to this day I got from DragonBall Z's Cell. I learned that it's smart to run away, to plan your moves ahead. Have a goal and work to get it. Everyone always told me that but watching him work and trick his way to becoming perfect taught me goals even ones blocked by someone stronger then you can be done with brains......he also taught me don't let your victories go to your head but I think he wishes he learned that before fighting Gohan.
yeah so you rather play a lesser known character that's basically a crappier punisher over someone that people would remember you for due to the characters sheer popularity?
Well I know my personal outlook and the topic of "evil" is very different for yours Lewis, I think that the obsession with villains is more a result of people coming to terms with the fact that such a label is highly subjective. People are intrigued because they've begun to see the aspects of the villains that they themselves relate to, just as they can with the heroic characters.
Regarding a focus on Villains: I have entire book of marvel stories about villains, with an intro by Stan Lee about how heroes are defined by villains. That without the Sheriff of Nottingham, Robin Hood isn't a hero. The book's pretty good, but sadly I can't remember it's name, or find it right now... It includes some interesting stories. Magneto and Xavier being physically fused together by a child mutant, forcing them to better understand each other's pain. The Absorbing Man and Eddie Brock escaping jail while chained together with power suppressing handcuffs, and when the man who tries to help them turns out to be a serial killer, Brock goes full "Lethal protector". And my personal favourite: Paste Pot Pete trying to go straight, selling glue guns. Despite the description, the story winds up being surprisingly good, as he worries about people realising who he is, fears he can't have a relationship because no-one could love an ex-villain, and he's forced to break his parole to maintain his job, finally leading to a climactic fight with USAgent.
I pretty much agree with Linkara on villain focusing. This is honestly why I'm not interested in Suicide Squad.Bad enough that BvS has completely disillusioned me on the DC Extended Universe but its third entry would be a Villain Group? I like Harely Quinn, but that's about it. Its really the first comic book movie that I do not want to see at all, even if it somehow ends up being good. I want to see (good) movies of heroes like Wonder Woman and Flash! Or heck, I want movies featuring Booster Gold and Blue Beetle! Which probably won't happen unless the DEU somehow ends up being successful enough to focus on superhero B and C-listers. I am not optimistic about this.
They might have had something on the whole "the reservoir is running out" idea if the emotions felt by living creatures (and the forces of the universe like heat and gravity, if you absolutely *have* to include that crap) actually did refill the well of energy over time, and the powers of the Lantern Corps/Light Smiths happened to use up the energy at a much faster rate. Most likely wouldn't have saved the idea, true, but it would make a little more sense, at least.
Better: they could have written it so the old multiverse operated on the "emotion reservoir" principles, but the current multiverse doesn't; Relic cannot be convinced his theory does not apply to the new reality, and his efforts to prove it _cause_ the "spectrum apocalypse".
I kinda like this comic... in parts. The lightsmith idea seems interesting (though not so much that reservoir theory) and the all caption boxes with little to no dialogue isn't a bad idea for an origin issue.
As I have just recently watched Inside Out (It came out late in the Philippines compared to the US), I laughed a lot harder than I should have about the joke. Would be nice for Linkara to give his thoughts on that but I doubt he had time to watch it. But really this is the first time that I've heard of the Lantern powers being fueled by emotions, so I can't help but imagine that Joy, Sadness, Fear, Disgust, and Anger are the best Yellow Lantern, Blue Lantern, Violet Lantern, Green Lantern and Red Lantern respectively, and Riley is a White Lantern personified. Disgust 4Best Green Lantern of them all!
Um, Mr. Linkara, sir, I would relish the opportunity to discuss your ideas, thoughts, theories, suppositions, and hypotheses about the emotional light spectrum.
I didn't actually get anything from Villain's Month, since at the time, the only DC comic I was collecting was Nightwing, which inexplicably didn't have a Villain's Month book despite the then current story arc for Nightwing having the perfect opportunity to do an issue on Tony Zucco.... and then the Forever Evil had Dick Grayson abandon the Nightwing persona to become a bland and generic secret-agent type character anyway, even though the last few issues of N52 Nightwing almost seemed to be setting up for DG to be taking on a young orphaned girl as his own protege, just how Bruce Wayne had done for him. The whole Forever Evil event, including Villains Month really was nothing more than a big pile of wasted opportunities in my opinion...
I have another mind bending question: If all of existence is tied to this reservoir, wouldn't the reservoir existing drain itself. It's kind of a self defeating concept!
You should read Endgame Linkara. The tie ins are actually tie ins, you could literally skip all of them and be fine with just the main book. It's actually a lot better than I thought it was going to be and aside from Joker somehow having the resources to spread his toxin to the whole Justice League it's probably the best Batman story of the New 52.
I like how they basically solved this ridiculous addition to canon by having Kyle reignite the well using his white Lantern powers. I do like Relic as a character though. His research of the spectrum & the source wall could still end up useful in the future. Though with Rebirth I imagine the well not self renewing was another thing we can blame on Dr. Manhatten. With DC's full history slowly being restored I imagine the internal logic moving forward will be the well is self replenishing as Linkara suggests
Thanks for that Legion of Supervillain shot from 'Legion of 3 Worlds' and others. Heh. I will always love the heroes more buy villains need to be important just so they can be well formed.
So recently in the comics some GLC member(including John and Guy) got time traveled to Relic's universe. Lightsmith staffs have a similar(if slightly different) interface to Power Rings, Converters(Lightsmith equivalent to Power Batteries) of any color can charge rings of any color(Red Light Converter charges a Green Ring), Converters give a cleaner charge to rings, if a ring is bathed in the light of a converter that ring's color will change(GLC Ring turned blue). Also new entities can be made.
13:43 "It's all splash pages, and there's no dialogue" *So it's not a comic...* it's a picture book/storybook. For some reason marketed to teenagers and adults instead of six years old.
The thing is in todays market it's easier to sell people on power fanstasy characters and who is more power fantasy than a super-villan as they are often written as though they are deep for being psychotic especially with the misinterpretation of today's reader base with the whole "It just takes one bad day" leading to people thinking that the Joker is brilliant.
Another reason it makes more sense for green to be courage is because presumably they all require will power to actually form the various constructs, it just varies as to which emotion fuels that will power.
Fun fact: Green is also associated with the power of TRUE COURAGE in King of Braves GaoGaiGar. The main character, Guy Shishioh, is also voiced by Nobuyuki Hiyama, who voices Link in the Legend of Zelda games, who is a green-wearing hero sometimes associated with courage. I wonder if this is a trend with some meaning to it, or just coincidence.
Spiral Energy and the Newtype energy surrounding the Axis shock in Char's Counterattack formed by Amuro were green too. I guess green is hot blooded courage and determination.
If you want to see this story done well, go read Sword Interval. Linkara has since done a video on it and its story can definately be compared to this but this is terrible vs sword interval is utterly fantastic
I agree. This fascination with villains has gone on for a bit too long. However, there is one aspect of villains that I can't seem to decide on personally. Mainly which type of villain is worse. By that, I'm referring to what I feel are the two main kinds of villains: 1. The kind who do bad things and don't care. 2. The kind who believe that their actions are justified.
The other thing is it took over 13B years for the reservoirs to drain last time, and at the end of the Previous arc, Kyle Rayner gave up his white lantern powers to refill it. So when Hal Jordan, famous hothead, suddenly turned into the Lantern police (no seriously, he tried to impose restrictions on other lanterns and corps using their own rings) it made even LESS sense. Like, Hal, there are maybe a few thousand people across the universe using the rings. Even if the number tripled over time, that’s still like 5B years before someone else has to become a white lantern and fly into the source wall again. We’re good, dude.
I remember that episode of TNG--the specifics were that there was a inhabbited region of space where subspace was fragile and frequent travels through it at warp were weakening it further, to the point local subspace was threatening to colapse; it was expanded on in the Voyager episode "The Omega Directive", where it was explained that it was caused by the Federation's experimentation with a particle called the Omega Molacule.
No those were two different things the subspace wearing down was analogous to carbon dioxide/monoxide damaging our ozone layer Omega particles were another thing entirely
Just to answer you question about the fascination over villains, for me personally, they're just fun to read about or watch. Of course, it shouldn't come at the expense of the heroes, but villains can be entertaining in their own right. Hell, for the longest time, Disney's stars WERE the villains, until Disney started improving their protagonists. And I myself love Forever Evil, and it's one of my favorite stories. Of course, at the end of the day, I'll always root for heroes like Spider-Man and Wonder Woman, but I won't complain if the villain take the center stage (if written competently).
18:47 Well, depending on which DC comic you're reading, the big giant hand is either God, Michael or Lucifer. According to one of the Swamp Thing storylines from Alan Moore, it's God because he shows up and merges good and evil in Post-Crisis Earth and appears as the hand. According to the Vertigo series Lucifer (a spinoff of The Sandman), Michael and Lucifer together were given the power to create the original universe that shattered into the multiverse. Of course, in that series Michael's daughter eventually becomes God herself, but we know that Post-Rebirth at the very least The Sandman happened to some degree thanks to Heavy Metal, so it's not impossible for God to still be formerly a teenage girl. In that, Michael created the raw building blocks and Lucifer shaped it into reality as we know it. Then a single Guardian went and broke their lovely creation and caused the multiverse. So basically, it's kinda Biblical?
I'm admittedly not much of a comic reader, but as for the why focus on villains aspect, I think part of it is the villains themselves. For the most part, they're either enjoyable to watch for various reasons like with Lex Luthor, Joker, Harley, etc; some are just plain intimidating like Thanos, Bane, Killer Croc and to an extent Apocalypse and Mister Sinister, sometimes both with Lex; and some are complex and compelling like (again) Lex Luthor, Harley Quinn, Beast, Mr. Freeze, Clayface, etc. ...Wow, I'm using a lot of DC Comics characters for this. Eh, it's appropriate for the review, so what the hell. Anyway, that, combined with the iconography of these villains is, to me at least, what keeps people coming back. That being said, I do agree there is too much of a good thing. And making them needlessly edgy doesn't make them more compelling. If anything, if I may be blunt, it comes off as masturbatory when it's used over and over again. It's one of the reasons I'm more a fan of non-Christopher Nolan Batman (though for the record, it IS good, just not my thing) stuff like The Animated Series (which was dark, but not to a needless degree) or Brave and the Bold (which was kinda like a cross between a successor of TAS and its own thing). But anyway yeah, that's my thoughts on the whole "Why we Adore Villains" question in this review. Not quite feeling any of what I said with this bozo Relic, however.
I agree that the lantern corps should not have limited reservoirs, at least in normal circumstances... But I could see the lights going out if their creatures died, however. The idea that the embodiments are responsible for maintaining their respective lights actually makes some sense to me. And these lights going out having odd effects on the laws of physics also sounds to me like that could make sense, depending on how it was done (more like electromagnetic wavelengths ceasing to exist than gravity going out).
OutrightMisfit none. you need to actually tap into the emotional spectrum to use it up. super sayain's use there anger to activate a biological function that multiples there KI reserves and it has nothing to do with the emotional spectrum.
While it wouldn't have solved the story's other problems... the stupid retcon would make far more sense if those old rules ONLY worked for Relic's universe. Think about it, whatever power that hand is had decided the emotional spectrum needed to be more self-sustaining and renewable so it tied that function to the color beings, as well as decoupling it from reality-fueling duties. Relic's motivation and the tragedy of his universe remains, but his attempts to apply the same logic to this new universe are fatally misguided and we don't end up completely screwing over the existing lore.
Leviadragon
That makes MUCH more sense.
(I wonder why nobody’s made an issue of green lantern to describe that idea.)
Wow that is very logical and I'm surprised DC didn't think of that.
My guess is he ws created specfically as a clearing house measure just so they could get rid of some of the corps (like Blue) and all of the entities)
Brilliant! Magnificat! With this one comment, you have proposed a solution that would have fixed everything about Relic. I am disappointed that this is not what was done. You, good sir, are a genius and I wish DC had your logic.
I kinda want to see the issue redone now, focusing more upon the effects of the various lights being extinguished. A skilled writer could take the loss of hope, loss of compassion, loss of fear, and such, and depict interesting changes to that society. Also, perhaps characterize them as "drives" rather than "emotions" so that will fits better into the scheme.
"Good news, everyone-our universe is dying!"
TheB29Bomber it's some weird dimension just outside
No it isn't. The Universe is defined as everything that is, was, or ever will be. We know of Heaven, therefore it is PART of the Universe.
Thank GOD!
Given the new 52, how’s that bad?
"In the time before time"
...you ever heard about Bionicle?
On the mysterious island of Mata Nui.
I'm upset that the Star Sapphire origin alien wasn't scantily glad. *banging fist on table* I demand equally awkward looking costumes for all species and genders, damn it!
V. M. You want to see Kirk in a star Sapphire thong?
I agree this is terrible.
bloodstone ore Dammit, I puked on my phone!
bloodstone ore Sure
I AGREE COMPLETELY!!!!!
I will say that Killer Frost's solo issue of Villains Month was pretty good. They really make her someone you can relate to.
the best thing about all those green lantern villian 1 shots were that Hal Jordan ALWAYS was bond to an asteroid on the cover. ALWAYS. Even Sinestro made it.
My head canon for this is that in all actuality Relic has a vendetta against light smiths, and blamed the destruction of the universe on them, while intentionally destroying it himself. This story isn't what actually happened, it's what Relic claimed happened
Your canon is best canon.
I like to image that the universe just occasionally resets and the light going away was a process of the universal reset that would occur regardless of the lightsmith's actions, and that he is just suffering some confirmation bias.
Makes way more sense than the issue Linkara reviewed.
That’s the plot of Gurren Lagaan
Love how Linkara goes on a rant about how we're focusing more on the villains than heroes when the promotion for Arkham Knights on the back says "Your Enemies Will Define You."
Also, a scientist preaching about how the universe is running out of energy, who travels to the end of the universe as it crumbles around him, only to be absorbed and converted into a new, god-like form which then tries to kill everybody? Did DC just introduce Galactus into their comics...?
+ZC-Infinity Reviews Holy crap! Relic is totally Galactus! God dammit, DC!
+ZC-Infinity Reviews It's the ad for Arkham Origins.
ZC-Infinity that's what I said!
You know what this means? WE CAN TIE MARVEL TO COUNTDOWN! LINKARA IS RIGHT AGAIN!
It's the DC Universe, of course happiness isn't part of its emotional spectrum~
Okay, that took a chuckle out of me.
DarkfireTaimatsu did rebirth help?
DarkfireTaimatsu but neither is despair, oddly enough
+bloodstone ore
Despair is the Source Wall for the DCEU.
DarkfireTaimatsu Ha!
If I was working on the Green Lantern comics, I could figure out how to make this whole thing work without ignoring it. Relic and several lanterns encounter a Guardian of the Well and we learn that indeed the Well did destroy the universe Relic came from, but not because it was drained as previously believed. It was because the Well was being MOVED. The Well itself does not run out of energy. The Guardian moved the Well and because Relic's universe was leaching on it so much (i.e. They used it to create cities that stand 24/7) it resulted in that universe's destruction.
Robo - Nidai or maybe it was how his universe worked but this one has the creatures and central batteries to recharge the universe. And atoms don't get to feel anymore
@@bloodstoneore4630😊
Did the old universe have controversies about where to drill for emotional energy?
Was there ever a light- spill caused by poor decision making?
Was there concern about polluting the environment with light?
British Emotionoleum
Incidentally, light pollution is actually a thing. (Where a large quantity of lights on makes us unable to see stars.)
All bad comics ever made are tied into Countdown. Especially One More Day
I realize you're joking but how does One More Day tie into Countdown? I would actually be very impressed if you could find a path from one to the other.
+shadowspider9 Well, Peter and superbrat prime, both complain and whine about dead things
+shadowspider9 Superboy Prime is from Earth Prime aka our world/the real world. So it would be logical to assume that on Earth Prime, Marvel Comics are printed and read, with all that entails to. Superboy Prime's shattering of reality in Infinite Crisis was an event of such stupid proportions, that the stupid resonated all the way to Earth Prime and changed Joe Quesada's continuity into believing that superheroes like Spider-Man should not be married.
+shadowspider9 Joe Quesada at one time partnered with Jimmy Palmiotti, who was one of the writers of Countdown.
IT'S ALL CONNECTED, MAN.
+Linkara-AtopTheFourthWall Joe Quesada and JMS are both talented and intelligent people. As are some people behind Countdown.
I've always preferred heroes over villains, but I've also found Earth-3 to be a very fascinating concept. A mirror universe where concepts like kindness, justice, and humility are literally alien concepts to the inhabitants.
...also, there are 6 fingers on that hand @ 7:16
So Relic's backstory…is a ripoff of Galactus's backstory.
Yup, except Galactus is much more sympathetic
It’s “the new 52”, ripoffs are the least of it’s problems.
I was thinking he was a ripoff of Al Gore
I'd say it's more a ripoff of the antispiral from Gurren Lagann.
Ok, this is an old episode and nobody's going to read this but screw it.
The reason people often care more about villains is because they're often allowed to be more complex or flawed. The thing is, making a character likeable or "relatable" isn't necessarily going to produce a super nuanced or interesting character, and people's perceptions of what a hero should be often restricts them in ways that villains aren't subject to.
If you look at a lot of the most acclaimed characters in literature, even before comic books took off, like say, Heathcliff from Wuthering Heights, they are often not very good or nice people and in fact have VERY serious character flaws or may do cruel or horrible things that the audience doesn't agree with. But it doesn't really matter at all and in fact those aspects just make them MORE interesting.
You can also see a good example of this in Watchmen. Out of all of the characters, not that many of them are exactly great people. The nicest ones are probably Owlman II and Silk Spectre but they're not exactly as interesting compared to The Comedian, Ozymandias, Dr. Manhattan or Rorschach.
Basically with a villain or a character who can be allowed to be unlikable in some ways you have access to a broader palette of the human experience and the potential to create a more complex character.
With that said I would agree that the way DC has been treating their villains by upping the edge or making them godlike is dumb, but I see that as a bit of a separate issue.
I agree. For a quick non-comics example, which character do people like more, the sarcastic drug addict manipulative jerk Dr. House, or the caring friendly nice guy Dr. Wilson?
See? This is why I like Guy Gardner so much!
That's not always a good thing. Not only with how DC has been going about things but with fans more than willing to overlook the horrible things a villain has done just because they find them more "interesting" than the heroes. There's a trope for that too, called "Draco in Leather Pants."
I think there is also another more simple solution
sometimes a villain is just entertaining with how dastardly he or she is, aka the "love to hate" trope
Take for example one of my favorite Villains Yuki Terumi from Blazblue.
now to start of with, Terumi is by no means a good person or even sympathetic he is a gigaintic royal grade A dick head, to the point that almost every member of the Blazblue cast has it out for him (which tbh is what he wants as he gets stronger by feeding of Misery hate and emotion)
the reason why the fans find him so entertaining? because he owns *every. Scene. in the game!*
seriously whenever Terumi is on screen you can't help but get enthralled in his actions because he as a villain is always looking like he's having the time of his life. This in turn is also what makes seeing him finally get whats coming to him so satisfying, because when the chips are down and they are backed into a corner, suddenly that smug aura vanishes.
this doesn't just apply to Terumi either:
Hades from Kid Icarus uprising
Junko from Danganronpa
Handsome Jack from Borderlands
Kano from Mortal Kombat
and yes even our old pal the Joker
However, what can make these guys and gal's even more entertaining is when they are a smug son of a bitch, but when they need to get serious, they put on their game face and you realize how these guys got so dangerous.
its Like whenever the Joker stops laughing and starts talking in a low voice, the first thought that goes through your mind is "oooooh crap", drawing on another trope:
*beware the silly ones*
I love villains more than the next person but I think the heroes get overlooked too much. There is a reason why people look up to heroes like Superman. They give us hope and inspire us to di goid in the world.
However there are people who think Superman is boring and not interesting but they fail to rally exam him. Superman does not see himself as a god. He just wants to use his power to protect the innocent and nake the world a better place.
Superman vs the Elite did a fantastic job examining Supernan and why he still fights for good and why people like Black cause more problems in the long run. Yes Black is entertaining but he is also an narcissistic sociopath who would crush a city just to prove a point if he wanted to. Might does not always make right.
Sherlock Holmes is another example of a hero who is viewed as "boring" but is far more complex when you examine him more. He may not always be the nicest bloke but he will always do the right thing avd yses his great intellect to solve crimes and bring criminals to justice.
Point is, villains may be cool but in of the day, we still root for someone like Supernan to defeat them. And considering the state of the world right now, we need heroes more than villains.
My theory is that people's love of villains is tied to the fact that the best of them deeply want something. I used to think at only villains could be compelling and heroes were all boring, but since then I've discovered a handful of heroes with very strong desires and motivation who all now some of my favorite characters of all time.
Getting a weird flashback to Galactus' origin.
+Igarappappa and i'm getting a flashback to the antman movie.
So, the last universe he was in didn't listen, so he started punching stuff until they would.
Sounds like a certain lord I know, who conquers all he sees.
The colors actually made some kind of logical sense . . . green is blue and yellow - making "courage" a combination of fear and hope.
Though...how do fear and rage make greed or hope and rage make love?
@@davidspring4003 When you're greedy, you fear other people taking your stuff and become angry if they do. Hope going into love should be obvious, but think of how often love is described as "fierce" or "burning", just like anger. One of the more famous Red Lanterns, Dex-Starr, unlocked his rage because his love was stolen from him.
Except that colors works way different when it comes to light XD
Green is one of the primary colors, coupled with red and blue (hence, RGB), while yellow is the result of green + red. All of them mixed together make white, which can be decomposed back into them (and btw that's how rainbows are created) , just like that Pink Floyd album cover.
But it's just a nitpick, of course, not to bash you or anything.
Now we have Year of the villian which is somehow even worse then villains month which i didn't even know that was possible
Anything's possible with bad writing. :)
@@Marxeenexe true and you're right about that.
Your reservoir rant was beautiful sir.
"It just raises too many questions."
AntiVillain1 "You tell 'em, Val Kilmer. You tell 'em."
So after giving it some thought, I realized how easily you could fix the story without needing to change anything but the text boxes/dialogue. First, change the problem with the emotion spectrum wells. Instead of having it be a source which can be depleted, make the problem that over time, exposure to the raw power of the well’s energy begins to affect the user’s minds. Corrupting them and eventually leading to the war between the light smiths (which is what destroys the old universe). Second, instead of relic getting his ideas laughed off for not having enough evidence, have it be that he discovers the truth too late and all the light smiths have already been corrupted. Thus, you can make relic’s motivation be that he feels guilty for not figuring out the problem in time to save the others. And to explain his more villainous actions, have it be revealed as he’s entering the new universe, that he too was affected by the emotional spectrum’s power while doing his research. This would give relic a more sympathetic backstory and make him more of a tragic villain than a arrogant moron. Plus, you wouldn’t end up screwing with the previously established continuity as much. And lastly, instead of having the lanterns be afraid of running out of power, have them be afraid of the possibility that over using their rings/lanterns could start screwing with their minds. That way, the problem is easier to fix and you don’t write yourself into a corner. Granted, that might not make for a great story, but it’d probably make for a better one than we actually got.
Thank you for putting them on youtube. The player channelawesome uses does not work sometimes. I am grateful for this.
So the Lightsmiths, in order to prevent their light-powers from running out, began fighting each other for control of the light and inevitably destroyed there entire universe? That sounds like the backstory of the Kingdom Hearts series.
16:08
Dear lord, it's Bill Cypher! He really has always been here! Alright, he got a paint job and a new hat between then and now, but it's totally him!
interesting
So... Instead of say, having the light reservoir start out being tapped by people using various emotions, and then in the end, having certain people from the old world become the Emotional Avatars, they instead have no explanation for them, say it is existence but never explain why it is tapped by emotions, and just have Relic survive by going into the Source Wall.
19:00 "They said he was a relic, accusing him of wanting to return to a less enlightened time." So, yeah, it was a nickname that was appropriated. His original name is not stated in the series.
Also, just to be fair, being entirely made of splash pages isn't a crime in and of itself. The Death of Superman was also entirely splash pages. In this case, it's just not handled nearly as well.
Admittedly, I enjoyed Lights Out as a whole. Yeah, I noticed some of what you mentioned in this particular issue, but binge reading the trade made it seem less standoffish especially because it appeared AFTER Relic attacks the blue lantern planet. I guess a big difference for me is that I've only just started getting into the Green Lantern stories (I have a LOT of back tracking to do) so I naturally didn't notice the retcons/continuity problems involved. Yeah, the environmental PSA was very obvious, but overall I thought it was a well put together story.
I mean, even if you don't understand the continuity problems, you have to wonder how the Lanterns were draining the universe when it would have taken all the corps put together a monstrous amount of effort and time to match the energy output of what a single star can do over the course of a few seconds, because, like... even Mogo is incredibly small next to the sheer ridiculous outputs that stars put out.
Like, how does that all work? Logistically? Even that whole "entire societies run on light with no physical constructions" should logically barely be even a writeoff of a lowball estimate of a percent of a fraction of another percent of another fraction of the amount of energy being generated, in that universe, at the exact same time, by like two stars of millions.
I believe part of the reason people are so interested in villains is that many times they drive the story. All stories revolve around conflict (man vs man, man vs nature, man vs self, man vs society). The more interesting the villain our hero is fighting, the more interesting the conflict, the more interesting the story. Though I will admit villain fans can go too far to the point of almost idolizing the villains. Sadly this can pour over into real life, with serial killers or the surviving Boston Bomber having fan girls.
I love seeing stories focusing on villains. A fascination with characters, really. I don't care if it's a villain or a hero, but since writers hate to put their heroes on true journeys with true struggles, I look to villains.
As an answer to why the "emotional well" idea doesn't work: it wasn't meant to. It was supposed to just work off of and individual's emotion, not some stupid source wall that takes the entire point of the lanterns away. The book right after Geoff Johns left just took everything that had been built up and said "screw it, lets add artificial depth where there doesn't need to be any"
This comic agrees with Marville that molecules have feelings. That alone is enough to suck.
I agree, this whole fixation on the villains has been taken too far, especially with the routes that they've taken with the villains like with the Joker. Personally, that's one of the reasons I like the Marvel movies a lot. The focus more on the heroes, the heroes journey and their struggles. Captain America, Guardians of the Galaxy, Iron Man, etc all focus more on the heroes than letting the villains steal the show. It's good to have fascinating and interesting villains, but not when it overshadows the heroes. We read superhero comics primarily to see the heroes save the day.
Yes but Marvel have the heroes beating each other up instead for not really good reasons
***** True. But I was talking about the movies, where the reason for Civil War was much better fleshed out and reasonable than in the comics.
Marvel movies are often criticized for subpar villains, but they're not needed for the kind of movies Marvel makes. Their stories are all focused on the hero's internal struggle, which explains their preference for Doppelganger-style villains that have similar abilities to the hero; they let the hero fight a version of themselves that made all the bad decisions or a representation of their own flaws.
I like focus on villains when its done WELL. When its about focusing on their backstories, personalities and about telling tragic and meaningful tales instead of gritty edginess.
Think Killing Joke instead of Death of the Family.
@@GeneralKenobi75 someone didn't see AT4W video of marvel civil war.
You know Relics origin is some what similar to Galactus. A scientist from a universe before our universe began and when they entered our universe they became a giant. That's where the similarities end but there origin is more or less the same.
The willpower thing is slightly dumb, but I find the whole "instilling fear" aspect of the Yellow lanterns even more confusing. First off, that's a really complicated power source if you need to get fear from somebody else.. and second, I've seen the Yellow lanterns portrayed as drawing on fear from the user a whole bunch of times, like in Blackest Night when Scarecrow was all excited that he was able to feel fear again. And really, it would just be a lot more interesting if Yellow Lanterns' power came from their own fears--I would love to see a Sinestro where he was characterized as lashing out because of all of his insecurities and fears, and the ring was amplifying this. It's more believable too, because Sinestro looks way too dopey to be actually scary.
I think the whole "instilling fear" part is a thing because the original Sinestro rings were made in the antimatter universe (whatever we're calling it this week) and therefore are contractually obligated to work on inverted logic - hence, working off the emotions of those OTHER than the user, when positive-matter rings generally don't. I assume the cases of Sinestro Corps members using their own fear for power are a combination of this lore detail being forgotten and changes to how the rings are configured now that there's a whole Corps instead of just one guy with a yellow ring.
Green Lantern creating a huge silly retcon that hampers future stories and puts past ones in a bad light. What is this, Spider-Man?
It sounds like the mythos story in the Kingdom Hearts series, specifically the one told to Kairi when she still lived in Radiant Garden. Only this time, its rings instead of keyblades.
I've seen almost all your videos so many times, and I can't help but find myself drawn to always rewatching them your contents just that good! Keep up the absolute top notch quality videos Linkara your an absolute treat and I'm so glad I've found your channel you certainly bring nothing but joy! Love you man, I don't ever want to see you stop, but at the same time I wouldn't ever want to see you do this if your heart wasn't in it, think it's great eventhough your a comic book channel you don't just stick to Marvel and DC like everyone else. I'm thinking of requesting for a patron review but would it be anytime soon or is they're a waiting list or something? Also I really enjoy your theme song but I absolutely adore your end credits song and always watch your videos to the end. Just gorgeous music I hope you have a wonderful Christmas Lewis, and can't wait to see more stuff, started watching your channel because of Doug but I started with Longbox of the Damned being a huge horror fan binged all them in a few days a year or two back and can't stand the wait! But guess it's worth it. Point being I obviously could go all day about how much happiness you've given my life. So I'll stop now but thank you Lewis.
I think all of DC and Marvel is in Event Fatigue.
Not DC they're getting good it's Marvel that has a problem
More so with marvel.
The concepts in this one snapped my brain.
In the intro, he complains about the MCU lacking compelling villains.
And then Phase 3 happened.
this particular story was one I actually read in a comics store a while back, it sort of gave me an idea in my own writing, different facets of space and time that can be manipulated by beings utalizing emotions (not unlike the lanterns) but its more like magic, and a single person can use abilities belonging to all emotions sort of like the phantom ring, accept the characters control their powers with a literal stone embedded in their hearts, things like Rage giving the ability to either super heat items, or super cool them through fun with thermal dynamics, compasion allowing gravitational manipulation, fear allowing an anti-magnetic like repulsion ability (depending on how scared the user was it would push people back from them more Resolve, allows for powerful mater manipulation, ect. because these abilities did tie into the functions of the universe the more they used there abilities, the sooner the end of the universe would happen (it would take several hundreds of thousands of generations to kill the universe though) but eventually the end comes, and the universe recycles itself, starting a gain, from square one, think of it like big bang following after a big crunch
The problem here is that Robert Venditti can't think something better for GL othen than pulling a uber-powerful villain out of nowhere every 2 issues.
“The shadow puppets they created were unmatched”...
Do ‘deformed rabbit’, it’s my favourite.
I like that you are so mature and collected. I find myself really trusting your opinions.
Lewis's comment about the MCU's (at the time) lackluster villains is amusing in hindsight when the next few years gave us Vulture, Ego, Mysterio, and most especially Thanos. That's right; THE MCU BOWS TO THE WHIMS OF LINKARA!
I was sorting my Magic binder when you used the MTG gag, Linkara. Nice.
I actually wish they would bring back decimal numbering. Maybe I'm just missing the point.
+Brian Green BOO!
I really wasn't serious. Read my comment again. Lines READ Lines
Brian Green
i did. i got the joke i just didn't like it.
Maybe quit being so negative..Two comments on something that you didn't like, care to make it three?
+Brian Green You might prefer comment 2.5... :p
Wait. A giant scientist who survived the destruction of the universe… is Relic the DC version of Galactus?
Who cares Kyle dumped his white load
Archer: phrasing
Ok his his white energy into the reservoir
i think the cover art should have been uncle from the Jackie Chan cartoon. "One more thing!"
Villains are very important to any story, but they shouldn't be more interesting or important than the hero. What's worse is when people pretend the villains are heroic in their own right; the Draco in Leather Pants effect (Doug Walker did a video on Loki as an example). Good villains contrast the hero: a good comparison would be Khan and Kirk, or Anakin and Luke: they are similar in a lot of ways, but they make different decisions when faced with the same situations, with the heroes making the right decision. The villain exists to make the heroes' struggle more compelling and to make the hero's triumph more important. It's my opinion that a villain's defeat should mirror their character-falling off a cliff because they insisted on stabbing the hero in the back, getting destroyed by the power they fought so hard to possess, being destroyed by another villain had their own agenda, etc. Even if we go back to the Bronze Age, we have tragic villains like King Saul or Hector of Troy, but their deaths and defeats are just as important as their characters, and again contrast with their adversaries. From Ahriman to the Joker, the villain is an evil counterpart of the hero.
When in comes to Supervillains, I really think Batman and the X-men (and a lesser extent Superman and Spiderman) are among the very few with striking villains.
Mike Keesay, a Godzilla fan, made the point that Gamera, unlike Godzilla, isn't as interesting as his villains, and so isn't as successful or memorable.
And Suicide Squad was just stupid in all incarnations
I enjoy villains because they provide contrast, and allow the audience to shift perspectives and let their dark side come out. Think of how many Khan, Joker, and Vader quotes there are-their pride and sadism is horrific, but it's memorable and in its own way amusing, right up to their defeats. Think about Team Fourstar: Vegeta and Nappa, then Frieza and Cell steal the show because while they're dangerous, they still get a lot of jokes, and even their defeats are made hilarious and tremendously satisfying. There's something about fear, awe, and revulsion that goes together with humor, appreciation, and envy. I can't place my finger on it.
DC's problem is that they don't get that the villain is boring without the hero to bounce off of. Evil winning is a scary possibility that should be real in the storyline buuuut if that's the premise then why should we care? I have the same problem with a lot of dystopian literature for the same problem: if the protagonist can't do something significant, reverse the odds, it's pointless. Despite what some idiots said, Rogue One would have been far less effective if it had ended with the shot of Vader rather than Leia.
The villain shouldn't be defeated right away, of course-losing the character means losing the ability to tell stories with them; hence my annoyance with My Little Pony's trend of making villains turn face every single season or being defeated in a single episode, but if the villain wins in the end, it's basically cheating the audience. Remember that show Phelan reviewed, Mortal Kombat Conquest? The final episode had Khan (no, the other Khan) sending in some anonymous flunkies that go kill every other character in the series. I hope you've enjoyed no moral theater! Or take that idiotic The Culling event-so a major character was introduced just to be killed, the event stretched forever, with dozens of characters...and nothing was accomplished with the villain not even admitting defeat. Or Cry For Justice, where Prometheus killed dozens of supporting characters (a variation on Women in Refrigerators), defeated almost every character, and is unceremoniously shot in the very last panel. The villain's triumph should be balanced by their defeat-that's basic storytelling!
Frankly, Solomon Grundy is a better Green Lantern villain than Relic
This comic is somehow dumber than that Star Wars short that explained Celibacy as a way to keep planets from exploding
I kind of like this mythology.
It may not be the most sensible, but it seems suitably mythic to me to be fun
From what I saw here, I think the idea of the reservoir isn't that the energy is limited in a cosmic sense - it will always be there, and was there when the universe remade itself - but rather that it's limit in a _practical_ sense - in that you can only safely use so much of it at any given time. I can see why this would be attractive for creators: it would fit the original ideas of the ebb and flow of the power, and put more focus on the lanterns ( the characters)themselves, rather than the rings.
Of course, that all assumes careful storycrafting on the part of DC, which I infer from your statements was not present.
19:38 And now, the Gold Lanterns.
Wait, Relic's origin is the same as Galactus'?
I was thinking that this was Superman's origin, except Jor-El climbed into the escape capsule himself.
Its similar, except the people in Galactus's old universe weren't directly responsible for its destruction
Only stupider.
Extra Extra yep
Steinklein Yup apparently so but somehow even worse speaking of relic we haven’t seen him like forever what happened to him
I think the reason so many people, mainly older readers, have become so interested in villains is because villains justify people's view that the world is dark and horrible and they empathize with how the world screwed them over. It's the same reason I think Batman has become so popular over the last decade. Because Batman perpetrates that the world is a dark and gritty place.
It's kind of depressing honestly because when things get bad what's really needed is heroes who give people hope the world can be better.
+shadowspider9 and it's these people that make villain monthly titles happen....Villain books cannot work eventually it turns into torture porn and that's disgusting
If so that's depressing
it is depressing and it's why so many people play and enjoy Grand Theft Auto because they enjoy living out their dark fantasies that they can just blow away their boss or annoying family members without any consequences whatsoever people hate upstanding goody two shoes squeaky clean heroes because they see them as too bland and generic...always having to shove some PSA down our throats and yet those same people will be rooting and hollering for Protagonists out of Breaking Bad because it's so dark gritty and realistic...they think anyone whose positive doesn't have a real life and doesn't understand how hard it is to play by the rules and be a moral upstanding citizen
+shadowspider9 Really I love villains a lot cause they teach me the world isn't dark. When even a monster has that little spark of kindness I attach to them more. Take Beast Wars Megatron, he was evil and wanted to kill all man kind but seeing him take a bath with a rubber ducky showed me as a little kid hey even monsters need baths and toys. Then a thought hey wait he's only a badguy cause the old Megatron lost a war and his people kept saying we could have won, course he's going to go bad he wants a better life. A life lesson I hold to this day I got from DragonBall Z's Cell. I learned that it's smart to run away, to plan your moves ahead. Have a goal and work to get it. Everyone always told me that but watching him work and trick his way to becoming perfect taught me goals even ones blocked by someone stronger then you can be done with brains......he also taught me don't let your victories go to your head but I think he wishes he learned that before fighting Gohan.
yeah so you rather play a lesser known character that's basically a crappier punisher over someone that people would remember you for due to the characters sheer popularity?
Well I know my personal outlook and the topic of "evil" is very different for yours Lewis, I think that the obsession with villains is more a result of people coming to terms with the fact that such a label is highly subjective. People are intrigued because they've begun to see the aspects of the villains that they themselves relate to, just as they can with the heroic characters.
So does that mean the hand there now is the World Forger?
If mold is persevering because of feelings, then I guess I should stop yelling at my moldy bread
Regarding a focus on Villains: I have entire book of marvel stories about villains, with an intro by Stan Lee about how heroes are defined by villains. That without the Sheriff of Nottingham, Robin Hood isn't a hero.
The book's pretty good, but sadly I can't remember it's name, or find it right now...
It includes some interesting stories.
Magneto and Xavier being physically fused together by a child mutant, forcing them to better understand each other's pain.
The Absorbing Man and Eddie Brock escaping jail while chained together with power suppressing handcuffs, and when the man who tries to help them turns out to be a serial killer, Brock goes full "Lethal protector".
And my personal favourite: Paste Pot Pete trying to go straight, selling glue guns. Despite the description, the story winds up being surprisingly good, as he worries about people realising who he is, fears he can't have a relationship because no-one could love an ex-villain, and he's forced to break his parole to maintain his job, finally leading to a climactic fight with USAgent.
I pretty much agree with Linkara on villain focusing. This is honestly why I'm not interested in Suicide Squad.Bad enough that BvS has completely disillusioned me on the DC Extended Universe but its third entry would be a Villain Group? I like Harely Quinn, but that's about it. Its really the first comic book movie that I do not want to see at all, even if it somehow ends up being good.
I want to see (good) movies of heroes like Wonder Woman and Flash! Or heck, I want movies featuring Booster Gold and Blue Beetle! Which probably won't happen unless the DEU somehow ends up being successful enough to focus on superhero B and C-listers. I am not optimistic about this.
They might have had something on the whole "the reservoir is running out" idea if the emotions felt by living creatures (and the forces of the universe like heat and gravity, if you absolutely *have* to include that crap) actually did refill the well of energy over time, and the powers of the Lantern Corps/Light Smiths happened to use up the energy at a much faster rate.
Most likely wouldn't have saved the idea, true, but it would make a little more sense, at least.
Better: they could have written it so the old multiverse operated on the "emotion reservoir" principles, but the current multiverse doesn't; Relic cannot be convinced his theory does not apply to the new reality, and his efforts to prove it _cause_ the "spectrum apocalypse".
7:19 when I looks up at space, I see an awful lot of bright white blemishes. Wonder where this takes place.
I would like to see more Green Lantern on this show
Yes I'm biased but still
I kinda like this comic... in parts. The lightsmith idea seems interesting (though not so much that reservoir theory) and the all caption boxes with little to no dialogue isn't a bad idea for an origin issue.
"I didn't read Batman:endgame and I'm sure it'll be ignored moving forward."
*Over a year later*
OH BOY, IF ONLY YOU COULD SEE THE FUTURE.....
IN THE YEAR 2000...in the year 2000
As I have just recently watched Inside Out (It came out late in the Philippines compared to the US), I laughed a lot harder than I should have about the joke. Would be nice for Linkara to give his thoughts on that but I doubt he had time to watch it.
But really this is the first time that I've heard of the Lantern powers being fueled by emotions, so I can't help but imagine that Joy, Sadness, Fear, Disgust, and Anger are the best Yellow Lantern, Blue Lantern, Violet Lantern, Green Lantern and Red Lantern respectively, and Riley is a White Lantern personified.
Disgust 4Best Green Lantern of them all!
Um, Mr. Linkara, sir, I would relish the opportunity to discuss your ideas, thoughts, theories, suppositions, and hypotheses about the emotional light spectrum.
I didn't actually get anything from Villain's Month, since at the time, the only DC comic I was collecting was Nightwing, which inexplicably didn't have a Villain's Month book despite the then current story arc for Nightwing having the perfect opportunity to do an issue on Tony Zucco.... and then the Forever Evil had Dick Grayson abandon the Nightwing persona to become a bland and generic secret-agent type character anyway, even though the last few issues of N52 Nightwing almost seemed to be setting up for DG to be taking on a young orphaned girl as his own protege, just how Bruce Wayne had done for him.
The whole Forever Evil event, including Villains Month really was nothing more than a big pile of wasted opportunities in my opinion...
I have another mind bending question: If all of existence is tied to this reservoir, wouldn't the reservoir existing drain itself. It's kind of a self defeating concept!
You should read Endgame Linkara. The tie ins are actually tie ins, you could literally skip all of them and be fine with just the main book. It's actually a lot better than I thought it was going to be and aside from Joker somehow having the resources to spread his toxin to the whole Justice League it's probably the best Batman story of the New 52.
I like how they basically solved this ridiculous addition to canon by having Kyle reignite the well using his white Lantern powers.
I do like Relic as a character though. His research of the spectrum & the source wall could still end up useful in the future.
Though with Rebirth I imagine the well not self renewing was another thing we can blame on Dr. Manhatten. With DC's full history slowly being restored I imagine the internal logic moving forward will be the well is self replenishing as Linkara suggests
Time before time... Bionicle?
Thanks for that Legion of Supervillain shot from 'Legion of 3 Worlds' and others. Heh. I will always love the heroes more buy villains need to be important just so they can be well formed.
I liked the Riddler villain comic. I like most things Riddler related though.
Personally I loved the black Adam comic, he was an awesome anti villain and one of the few redeeming qualities of the awful Shazam new 52 comic
Batman Forever. Checkmate.
You and Scott Snyder
@@FrenchPaul1988 Well he is still much better than Tommy Lee "I am just going to be the Joker damn the script" Jones
It's not a big deal but your 2015 AT4W playlist is missing this episode. I think it should be between Pokémon RéBurst and Team Youngblood #1.
So recently in the comics some GLC member(including John and Guy) got time traveled to Relic's universe. Lightsmith staffs have a similar(if slightly different) interface to Power Rings, Converters(Lightsmith equivalent to Power Batteries) of any color can charge rings of any color(Red Light Converter charges a Green Ring), Converters give a cleaner charge to rings, if a ring is bathed in the light of a converter that ring's color will change(GLC Ring turned blue). Also new entities can be made.
13:43 "It's all splash pages, and there's no dialogue"
*So it's not a comic...* it's a picture book/storybook. For some reason marketed to teenagers and adults instead of six years old.
The thing is in todays market it's easier to sell people on power fanstasy characters and who is more power fantasy than a super-villan as they are often written as though they are deep for being psychotic especially with the misinterpretation of today's reader base with the whole "It just takes one bad day" leading to people thinking that the Joker is brilliant.
Another reason it makes more sense for green to be courage is because presumably they all require will power to actually form the various constructs, it just varies as to which emotion fuels that will power.
Fun fact: Green is also associated with the power of TRUE COURAGE in King of Braves GaoGaiGar. The main character, Guy Shishioh, is also voiced by Nobuyuki Hiyama, who voices Link in the Legend of Zelda games, who is a green-wearing hero sometimes associated with courage.
I wonder if this is a trend with some meaning to it, or just coincidence.
Spiral Energy and the Newtype energy surrounding the Axis shock in Char's Counterattack formed by Amuro were green too. I guess green is hot blooded courage and determination.
Giant blue hand? Dr. Manhattan cameo confirmed.
Given to recent comics that isn't a surprise
Considering whats going on in Rebirth, that may actually wind up being true.
"Courage" is not an emotion either. :P It's a trait. It really is the same type of word as "willpower".
If you want to see this story done well, go read Sword Interval. Linkara has since done a video on it and its story can definately be compared to this but this is terrible vs sword interval is utterly fantastic
1:57 Super Eyepatch Wolf had the best answer on this with his "What makes a villain feel real" video.
I agree. This fascination with villains has gone on for a bit too long. However, there is one aspect of villains that I can't seem to decide on personally. Mainly which type of villain is worse. By that, I'm referring to what I feel are the two main kinds of villains: 1. The kind who do bad things and don't care. 2. The kind who believe that their actions are justified.
The other thing is it took over 13B years for the reservoirs to drain last time, and at the end of the
Previous arc, Kyle Rayner gave up his white lantern powers to refill it. So when Hal Jordan, famous hothead, suddenly turned into the Lantern police (no seriously, he tried to impose restrictions on other lanterns and corps using their own rings) it made even LESS sense. Like, Hal, there are maybe a few thousand people across the universe using the rings. Even if the number tripled over time, that’s still like 5B years before someone else has to become a white lantern and fly into the source wall again. We’re good, dude.
I remember that episode of TNG--the specifics were that there was a inhabbited region of space where subspace was fragile and frequent travels through it at warp were weakening it further, to the point local subspace was threatening to colapse; it was expanded on in the Voyager episode "The Omega Directive", where it was explained that it was caused by the Federation's experimentation with a particle called the Omega Molacule.
No those were two different things the subspace wearing down was analogous to carbon dioxide/monoxide damaging our ozone layer
Omega particles were another thing entirely
since this episode we got Thanos, Vulture, Dormammu, Yellow Jacket, and Ego
Just to answer you question about the fascination over villains, for me personally, they're just fun to read about or watch. Of course, it shouldn't come at the expense of the heroes, but villains can be entertaining in their own right. Hell, for the longest time, Disney's stars WERE the villains, until Disney started improving their protagonists. And I myself love Forever Evil, and it's one of my favorite stories. Of course, at the end of the day, I'll always root for heroes like Spider-Man and Wonder Woman, but I won't complain if the villain take the center stage (if written competently).
6:44 Maybe Relic saw a video featuring that awesome salt sprinkling and wanted to try it himself.
The real world emotions are joy and sadness in their own lobes, and a single lobe for anger, disgust, fear, and surprise
17:36
Molecules?
Does this mean that the New 52 is in the same universe as Marville?
That actually explains a lot
While probably not intentional I actually like that each page is a splash page it gives the comic a novel format even if it is laziness
18:47 Well, depending on which DC comic you're reading, the big giant hand is either God, Michael or Lucifer. According to one of the Swamp Thing storylines from Alan Moore, it's God because he shows up and merges good and evil in Post-Crisis Earth and appears as the hand. According to the Vertigo series Lucifer (a spinoff of The Sandman), Michael and Lucifer together were given the power to create the original universe that shattered into the multiverse. Of course, in that series Michael's daughter eventually becomes God herself, but we know that Post-Rebirth at the very least The Sandman happened to some degree thanks to Heavy Metal, so it's not impossible for God to still be formerly a teenage girl. In that, Michael created the raw building blocks and Lucifer shaped it into reality as we know it. Then a single Guardian went and broke their lovely creation and caused the multiverse. So basically, it's kinda Biblical?
I'm admittedly not much of a comic reader, but as for the why focus on villains aspect, I think part of it is the villains themselves. For the most part, they're either enjoyable to watch for various reasons like with Lex Luthor, Joker, Harley, etc; some are just plain intimidating like Thanos, Bane, Killer Croc and to an extent Apocalypse and Mister Sinister, sometimes both with Lex; and some are complex and compelling like (again) Lex Luthor, Harley Quinn, Beast, Mr. Freeze, Clayface, etc.
...Wow, I'm using a lot of DC Comics characters for this. Eh, it's appropriate for the review, so what the hell. Anyway, that, combined with the iconography of these villains is, to me at least, what keeps people coming back. That being said, I do agree there is too much of a good thing. And making them needlessly edgy doesn't make them more compelling.
If anything, if I may be blunt, it comes off as masturbatory when it's used over and over again. It's one of the reasons I'm more a fan of non-Christopher Nolan Batman (though for the record, it IS good, just not my thing) stuff like The Animated Series (which was dark, but not to a needless degree) or Brave and the Bold (which was kinda like a cross between a successor of TAS and its own thing).
But anyway yeah, that's my thoughts on the whole "Why we Adore Villains" question in this review. Not quite feeling any of what I said with this bozo Relic, however.
I agree that the lantern corps should not have limited reservoirs, at least in normal circumstances... But I could see the lights going out if their creatures died, however. The idea that the embodiments are responsible for maintaining their respective lights actually makes some sense to me. And these lights going out having odd effects on the laws of physics also sounds to me like that could make sense, depending on how it was done (more like electromagnetic wavelengths ceasing to exist than gravity going out).
16:11 I’m pretty sure that’s the opposite of how Pandora’s box works
Let's be fair Lewis, its not so much DC choosing to do this retcon as it is Robert Venditti, the writer of the book.
Daniel Adkins he got much better by the time the godhead event happened.
He basically ignored the retcon by the time rebirth happened
wait, if super heroes who use emotion drains the well, then how much was lost when Goku/Gohan/ other super saiyens went Super Saiyen?!
OutrightMisfit
none.
you need to actually tap into the emotional spectrum to use it up.
super sayain's use there anger to activate a biological function that multiples there KI reserves and it has nothing to do with the emotional spectrum.