Spoiler Alert: nightcrawlerfan's Birthday Review, Part 3 · 3:54am Sep 29th, 2014
: Huh; we might want to stop using his clips before we get sued. Anyways, we then cut to Hal's training session by Tomar-Re and the brutish Kilowog. Who, as played by Michael Clarke Duncan, is pretty awesome. For all five minutes of screen time that he gets. Sinestro, however, was apparently too bored arranging an assault on a planet-destroying monstrosity and decides to train Hal by sparring with him. Hal starts by creating a sword, which Sinestro derides as 'human.' I dunno, pal, based off of your architecture, I'd imagine your race is just as fond of phallic symbols as the next.
: Furthermore, why is Sinestro so antagonistic towards humans? They can't be the ONLY primitive species that's too big for their britches. Making the humans the most contemptible of species is no more realistic than making them the shining light of the universe like most films.
Regardless, he spends most of the fight kicking Hal's flank and talking about the nature of fear. His speech sounds kind of familiar, but I can't quite put my hoof on it.
: Oh, well, I'm sure I'll figure it out eventually. Hal throws a hissy fit about getting beat up and decides to quite the Corps. But he still keeps his ring, because that's how a job works, right? Once they give you stuff, you get to keep it even after you leave?
We then go back to Hector Hammond, who's beginning to develop telepathy and telekinesis. Because the power of fear allows you to read minds. Wait, what?
: We then meet Hector's pa, a Senator who works wit' Ferris Aircraft an' was responsible fer Hector gettin' ta look at Abin Sur's body. He's casually dismissive of 'is son an' wishes he'd be more assertive. But he's much more supportive 'a Hal, who's Hector's childhood friend. Oh, did we ferget ta mention that? 'Cause we pro'bly shoulda learned that sooner. And when DC reused the Peter Parker-Norman Osborn-Harry Osborn relationship triangle in Smallville, it was appropriate. Here, it's just random an' hackneyed.
: We then cut to Sinestro and his squad, who attack Parallax and have absolutely no effect. They all die except for Sinestro....for some reason. How he escaped isn't really explained. Sinestro heads back to Oa, and meets with the Guardians, who each have 20 feet of robes dangling from their dwarfish floating bodies. Realizing that Parallax intends to attack Oa, Sinestro demands the Guardians tell him everything they know about Parallax. It turns out that one of the Guardians attempted to harness the power of fear and became eeeevil as a result, leading to their greatest secret and shame. Which probably would've been more secret if they hadn't kept his half-destroyed chair lying around their meeting chamber. After hearing that one of the most powerful beings in the universe succumbed to the eeeevil of fear, Sinestro suggests that the Green Lanterns start using rings powered by fear to fight him.
................
: WHAT THE BUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU, MOVIE!?: Fluttershy, are you okay?!
: Alas, my lord, I have but kill'd a fly...Your girlfriend isn't more important than the whole universe...Negaduck!
: Um, girls, I think the film broke Fluttershy. Rainbow Dash, I think you're the one who should handle this.
: Right. C'mon, Flutters, everything will be alright.: What's a paladin?
: Moving on, after that....idiocy, we cut to a party on Earth to celebrate the fact that Ferris Aircraft got the drone contract in spite of Hal's mistake. You know, it's a lot easier to emphasize with Hal when he actually has problems and his actions have consequences. Hector's there, too, and he "drunkenly" tries to impress his crush, Carol, by telling her about his secret alien autopsy. I use quotations because even though he's described as drunk, he certainly doesn't act drunk at all, just a tad stupid. His father, however, interrupts him before he can give away classified government information, then leaves the party in his helicopter. Tired of his father's interference in his life, Hector uses his telekinesis to covertly cause the helicopter to crash. This forces Hal to turn into Green Lantern and save Caro....I mean, the party. Because, yes, we wanted Green Lantern's first rescue to take place on Earth, making the scene indistinguishable from the first rescue in any superhero movie. You have an intergalactic hero, take advantage of it!
: His plan foiled, Hector goes home and screams like a little filly while his head grows bigger. Then there's a bunch of filler and scenes that in a good movie would be considered character development. And Carol finds out that Hal's Green Lantern, yada yada yada. Eventually, the government realizes that the man digging into an extraterrestrial carcass may just possibly have been contaminated, and Waller goes to pick him up. But before they leave, he reads her mind....for some reason. It's not terribly threatening, and she's not nearly important to the plot to warrant seeing her back story, so what's the point?
And we come to the WORST scene in the movie for me. Sinestro's "signs of defection" as I call it.
Okay so it's not because he thinks the Guardians are too soft, it's because he literally wants to try the "Fight fire with fire" theory! NEWS FLASH THAT NEVER WORKS! And the fact it's coming from SINESTRO, who is usually very level headed and intelligent, makes me just...... GAH!
2492434 It's not my least favorite-that has to go to the final battle-but it is almost assuredly second. Sinestro's definitely an extremist, but he's not stupid. And yet, in this scene they had him fail logic that a first grader could easily understand. It really takes away any sense of intelligence or nuance this character had.