Green Lantern: Emerald Knights Advanced Review
By Hervé St-Louis
June 1, 2011 - 07:49
Studios: Warner Premiere
DVD $19.98/Blu-ray $24.98
Starring: Nathan Fillion, Elizabeth Moss, Henry Rollins, Jason Isaacs, Kelly Hu, Arnold Vosloo, Roddy Piper, Wade Sunil Malhotra, Williams
Directed by: Chris Berkeley, Lauren Montgomery, Jay Oliva
Produced by: Bobbie Page, Sam Register, Bruce W. Timm
Running Time: 70 Minutes
Release Date: June 7 2011
Distributors: Warner Home Video
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This animated film is based on a running theme in Green Lantern’s history – tales from past Green Lanterns that explored the richness of the Corps and its history. Specifically in this direct to home release meant to support the upcoming Green Lantern movie, is a focus on current popular characters important to the upcoming film and featured recently in various Green Lantern comic books. There’s a story with Avra, the first Green Lantern, one with the corps’ drill instructor Kilowog, another with Laira, a princess that has to fight her own family to stop them from plunging her world further into a pariah status. There is an interesting story with Abin Sur, Green Lantern Hal Jordan’s predecessor and finally, there’s a story with Mogo, the most reclusive Green Lantern ever.
This animated film takes place in the years before Sinestro had turned bad and vowed to eradicate the Green Lantern Corps and the Guardians. Although Hal Jordan is deemed the star of this film, it’s really Arisia whose eyes are those of new viewers discovering the world of the Green Lanterns for the first time. Hal Jordan doesn’t really do anything heroic or save the day. It’s a team effort and I really like how the entire Corps was built up instead of this being a focus on Hal Jordan. The cartoon also appear to be in its own continuity, and not related to the previous Green Lantern: First Flight animated cartoon, since the design is different. This is something that Warner Brothers Animation has been doing recently with all the DC Comics’ based direct to video animated films. Each stand on their own, although they are clearly taken from various comic books which in themselves are all tied together. So here, we have Nathan Fillion playing a stoic Green Lantern, as opposed to Christopher Meloni who played a brash Hal Jordan.
The stories all focus on comic book stories which are relatively recent and easy to find by comic book readers instead of focusing on Green Lantern Corps stories from a generation ago. Still we get to see many of the classic Green Lantern characters that many love, like Tomar-Re, Ch’p and Galius Zed who appears to die in one of the stories, yet appears later in the final fight against Krona.
Visually, the entire film has been animated by overseas studios giving the animation a different vibe and the character design a very realistic feel not usually found in other DC Comics’ animated films. I like it. The look is as classic as possible and all the various alien species delectable to watch in action. The animation is strong. For example, the fight Laira has with her father is extremely well animated. I really like how the Jack Kirby signatures anti matter energy black balls were animated when Krona fought the Green Lanterns. Other touches include the various effects showing groups of Green Lanterns from afar. There weren’t that many constructs as most of the Green Lanterns just used their power rings as laser cannons, but I did like the tricks they often displayed where they circled themselves with a ring of light to disable several alien ships and enemy weapons at once.
If you are new to the world of Green Lantern and want to find out more about these characters which I predict will be very popular once the movie is released, this direct to home film, available in both DVD, digital download and Blu-Ray will be perfect for you. If you are already quite familiar with the Green Lanterns or haven’t paid attention to them in years, but always enjoyed the concept, this Green Lantern: Emerald Knight is for you too. In fact, there is enough lore and cameos to keep hardcore fans busy for quite a while.
The features were few because I got the DVD instead of the Blu-Ray/DVD combo package. All there was on my disc were previews of other DC Comics direct to video animated films and previews of the Green Lantern video game and an ad for Mattel’s social network for toy collectors. I did find it very annoying that every time one started the disc, that it would show the copyrights and anti-piracy warnings that could not be skipped at all. Even if the disc was already in the player, it would not remember that the viewer had already seen the warnings. This can get very irritating as the audience watching this film on a disc is not the one that will pirate Green Lantern: Emerald Knights. Pirates will get their copies from other sources. The language options, however were decent with Spanish, French, Portuguese and more. In past direct to video DC Comics-based animated films, there was very little choice for non-English speakers. I guess the urgency of the world-wide film release has made offering multiple language tracks imperative for Warner Brothers.
Rating: 8.5/10
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