Drooling telepaths! Carnivorous aliens!  Pre-evil pink space Hitlers!  Can Green Lantern be any more fun to read?  I submit that it cannot! 

As Part Four begins, Hector Hammond is examining the remains of Abin Sur's ship before impetuously opening up the craft's fuel reservoir and exposes himself to the meteor that makes him DC's version of Samuel Sterns.  Before you can say 'That's not what happened originally!" Hammond goes Tetsuo Shima on everyone onsite by mind-killing them and escapes.  Elsewhere, Hal is told everyone quit in protest of the Ferrises' handling of the airfield.  As Hal shows up to hand in his as well, Carol makes the proverbial offer he can't refuse: stay and he can be a pilot again. 

This, naturally leads to Hal's return to the air and the scene demonstrated on the cover: his first meeting with Sinestro.  Immediately, Hal's "I play by my own rules" attitude clashes with Sinestro's "Always obey your superiors," the greatest of cosmic ironies given how things will turn out.  The meeting is truly interesting especially Sinestro's comment 'Anger distorts everything."  Again, the great irony of ironies that the man who will later dedicate his life to vengeance and wrath is telling Hal to not be an egotistical maniac. 

Later, as Hal lands Carol chews him out for flying under radar (he wrecked it and Sinestro rebuilt it in actuality) before Hammond goes by to claim "his' woman.  Meanwhile, Atrocitus has enacted some mystic ritual to find the one who will "birth the black": William Hand.


Like the last umpteen issues, Geoff Johns and Ivan Reis knocked this out of the park.  Geoff's plotting has added a layer of foreshadowing to the Blackest Night laced throughout Hal's origin as Ivan's polished and clean pencils continue to make this book shine.  We can add yet another addition for Geoff Johns and Green Lantern in the "win" pile.  This was a good one, to be sure.