Guy Gardner Recommendations? (Winston Crutchfield!)

Hey Winston! You must have been a little busy when I e-mailed you about this, since I never heard back. But I caught you red-handed posting on the forums! So I'm looking to get my answer here, now!

Been thinking about you as I've found myself going back and exploring the Vuldarian/Warrior era of Guy Gardner through DC Universe Infinite. I had a few issues already that I bought way back in the day because they tied into Green Lantern stories and I always remember really liking the art style married to the power concept. (Gross body-horror transformation! Woohoo!)

I remember you saying a long time ago that you really liked Guy Gardner, pointing out that his blunt and crass characteristics were in part an outgrowth of his absolute honesty (a key GL pre-requisite), which has always made me interested in giving the character a fresh look.

Anyway, I was wondering if there is an era or series or storyline that comes to mind that really brings to the surface what you have liked about the character. Any suggestions?

Hope you and your family are doing well and seeing signs of God's love and care for you!

Paeter, I am so sorry I missed your email! Tax time gets me running in circles around the office, but that's no excuse!

You know I'm always up for talking comic books!

Guy Gardner....

I've always thought the most interesting thing about Guy Gardner is that he started out as a PE teacher and later a social worker. He put other people first before he got the powers instead of after. I liked that.

I didn't give much thought to the character. He was a buffoon in JLI, but I liked that his rebellious attitude put a twist up the shorts of critics and readers both. See, for all his faults and his clashes of worldview with uptight heroes and liberal publishers, Guy was consistently written as a Hero - someone who tried to do what he thought was right. For me, that meant watching him tell off the types of people I was frustrated with and he could get away with it (it's his book after all).

In a comics culture where the stories are praised for being "socially relevant", Guy Gardner bucked the trend by espousing unpopular ideas and validating them by virtue of being held by the central character. This character was SUBVERSIVE in the same way that Lobo, Wolverine, and Deadpool were subversive, but with a cultural focus instead of a violent one. I liked that.

I started following the character for its own sake with Guy Gardner Reborn, after he left the Corp. My favorite run is the brief time between the loss of the power ring and gaining the Vuldarian powers. I only followed briefly after that. The character matured and I thought he became a solid supporting character for Green Lantern Kyle Rayner, but I just couldn't get into the "gross, body horror" of the Vuldarian power set.

I know the character received a lot of criticism for being crass, rude, vulgar, violent, jingoistic, and ultra-macho (intentionally designed that way according to Steve Englehart), but I always liked that his standing as a heroic character and later as the main character of his own book, legitimized those behaviors in a way that made characters who criticized him look either foolish and indecisive, or intolerant and bullying. By way of famous example: Batman lays out Guy with a single punch over a leadership dispute, Batman doesn't listen to him, and Batman then proceeds to ignore Captain Marvel, the dude with the freaking Wisdom of Solomon. It was at the time, and still kind of is, a comment on the culture of comics.

mindspike wrote:Paeter, I am so sorry I missed your email! Tax time gets me running in circles around the office, but that's no excuse!

LOL! I know that's tongue in cheek, but for the sake of anyone reading who may misunderstand, dealing with taxes and grown-up stuff is the PERFECT excuse to drop the ball in geeking out. LOL!


BUT, with taxes out of the way...

Thanks so much for this! Interesting to hear even more of your take on Gardner. I've only seen the page where Batman one-punches Gardner but it's legendary and referenced repeatedly elsewhere after. Now that I have DCU Infinite I'll have to google to figure out the issue and read the whole thing to appreciate the context.

I have to ask, even though I know you have issues with Geoff Johns, did you giggle a little bit in Green Lantern Rebirth when Hal Jordan floored Batman with one punch and Guy couldn't help but live-up the moment?

Here's a link to the page if you haven't seen it: http://geekhardshow.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/HalPunchBats.jpg

Of course, would have been better if they had let Gardner do it...