GREEN LANTERN vol2 #16 (1962)
by John Broome & Gil Kane
Female supervillains are quite rare for the Silver Age, especially when fighting guys, but Green Lantern has a prominent exception.
Her costume is remarkably similar to that of the Golden Age Star Sapphire, without the stockings.
We begin with Carol Ferris, Green Lantern’s love interest (and technically his boss!) flying her personal plane, the “Lady Carol”.
Their relationship is something of a variation of the classic Silver Age romantic triangle. She’s in love with both the hero and the secret identity, instead of the Lois Lane situation of just being interested in the hero.
That’s when, out of nowhere, she’s kidnapped by the Zamaron…
…who think she’s their queen!
This is the first appearance of the Zamaron. They will later be connected to the Guardians Of The Universe, but for now they’re from a planet of immortal women…
…with a really, REALLY stupid form of government: whoever looks like their last queen becomes the next one.
Carol refuses to leave Earth because she’s in love with Green Lantern (!!!), so the Zamarons give her an even greater power thanks to an organ. (WTF!?)
In order to become queen she has to recognize she’s greater than Green Lantern, so the Zamarons arrange for a fight. Yeah that’s a GREAT way to vet your new queen!
Superman keeps his identity a secret to Lois to protect her life (even if that makes little sense).
Green Lantern, however, has a completely selfish reason.
Yeah the more I review Green Lantern the more I realize I’ve probably been too harsh with Silver Age Superman… Hal Jordan is just. The Worst.
He also completely fails to recognize Star Sapphire is Carol, but that’s to be expected in this era.
What the… if the Zamarons don’t care about Earth, why don’t they just send her to steal the real mirror instead of bothering with a fake!?
As a result of Carol fighting the jewel compelling her to fight Green Lantern, Star Sapphire is developing as another personality.
That’s pretty dumb. Wouldn’t it be easier if the jewel controls whoever wears it? It would make the entire “let’s make a random alien our queen” have sense!!!
She accidentally knocks him out, something that happens with alarming frequency despite the fact that his ring is SUPPOSED to protect him at all times.
It’s at this point that I begin to wonder: is Carol the only person in the universe who looks like the former queen? Can’t they try Kandor? EVERYONE has a lookalike in Kandor!!!
I truly don’t get the reason for the unnecessary details about Star Sapphire stealing fake stuff. Is it because they don’t want to make Carol a real criminal? She’s under mind control!!!
In addition to her “repeller ray”, Star Sapphire can also manipulate matter with… rather useless results.
The ring detects some kind of energy reaching Star Sapphire (wasn’t she powered by the jewel on her head!?), and blocks it causing her to faint from the excitement. (WTF!?)
And so we end with the Zamarons realizing Carol is not fit to be their queen, wiping the entire ordeal from her mind.
But they still leave the Star Sapphire behind, so the Zamarons are just as incompetent as the Guardians Of The Universe.
Historical significance: 8/10
Star Sapphire will obviously return and be a recurring Green Lantern villain. The Zamarons will also have some significance, being revealed to be from the same species of the Guardians.
Which has… weird implications.
Silver Age-ness: 10/10
He has not, in fact, seen the jewel before.
Does it stand the test of time? 4/10
There’s a story buried in there. Not a good story, mind you, but you COULD do something interesting with either the Zamarons or the idea of a split personality.
But unfortunately this issue wastes WAY too much time on irrelevant details and has some amazing coincidences.
How close is this to the modern character?: 6/10
I’ll admit I don’t know much about Star Sapphire and I don’t particularly care for her as a villain.
I do like Carol, as she’s one of the more interesting and complex Silver Age girlfriends, but the whole split personality thing doesn’t bring much to the table. Admittedly it IS a cool name and that costume is a classic for a reason.
Which means that, of course, it had to be completely ruined in her latest incarnation.
Come on guys, there’s fanservice and there’s being ridiculous.
Especially since she HAD a modern depiction that was pretty badass!!!
I used to be a Green Lantern fan but I completely dropped the franchise once they went into that unbelievably stupid “emotional spectrum” crap.
And of course they couldn’t leave Star Sapphire alone, so now we have the Star Sapphires serving as the “Violet Lantern Corps” powered by love.
Ugh. Who wants to bet they wanted to go with “Pink Lantern Corps” until they noticed sapphires are not pink?