The cause of Hal Jordan’s Blackened hand has been revealed, but what does this mean for Anomaly Jo? We find out in Absolute Green Lantern #5.
ABSOLUTE GREEN LANTERN #5
Written by AL EWING
Art and Main Cover: JAHNOY LINDSAY
Variant Covers: JULIET NNEKA, TIRSO, ALEX ECKMAN-LAWN
Page Count: 32 pages
Release Date: August 6, 2025
This review contains spoilers
Absolute Green Lantern #5, like others, begins with a circular image and text. We’re introduced to Todd Rice, the diner owner from Evergreen. In other universes, Rice is the hero Obsidian, son of the original Green Lantern, Alan Scott. Since he’s shipped off to Hector Hammond’s lab for medical treatment, it’ll be interesting to see if Ewing incorporates his superhero alter ego into the Absolute Universe.
Absolute Green Lantern #5 reveals how Hal Jordan’s hand became blackened. I won’t spoil the details, but it’s a critical part of the story. Afterward, we return to Hal and Jo’s fight in the desert. Hal demands to know what happened to her, but Jo senses he’s losing control of the blackened hand and refuses to tell him. It turns out she’s right; the hand triggers a painful memory for her, but she manages to shake it off and escape from Hal.
A chase continues though with Jo being followed by the blackened hand. Hector Hammond comes to a conclusion that Jo possess the power in order to move the giant lantern that had come crashing to Earth in an earlier issue. Jo is chased into the centre of the giant lantern and again due to how important this is to the issue I won’t reveal anything further.
The way in which Ewing has started to bring the arc together has been a true joy to read, although at times I have found myself getting frustrated that the drip feed has been slow, but I have a feeling that this slow burner is about to erupt into something spectacular. Ewing is clearly building a universe full of lore from the ground up and slow pacing should be expected. However, I genuinely look forward to the release date each month to see what we get to find out this time.
Lindsay’s artwork throughout Absolute Green Lantern #5 is for the most part incredible, especially everything positioned within the foreground of the panels. Though comparing the work to some of the previous issues the background parts of the panels can sometimes seem a little lack lustre. There’s a panel with the desert as the background though there isn’t much to be seen usually in the desert the linework for the hills/rocks seems somewhat rushed.
Then for much of the other panels the backgrounds have been blurred as if to be out of focus, I’m not too sure if this is a creative call or to pull back the amount of work required to make every panel absolutely incredible. If it’s the latter, I’d be a little disappointed to find that out. Though I must give Lindsay some props for some of the images he’s had to conjure up for this issue, drawing the likes of the black hand extending for as far as it does can’t be an easy feat, but his proportions and form is perfect for it.
Final Thoughts
I’m so glad that Ewing is finally getting to the meat of the arc. We now have explanations for a fair bit that we were missing and we have some excellent bits that have been set up for future issues. Lindsay’s artwork is great, aside from some of the background linework that lets the quality of each panel down just a bit.
Many would argue that the background isn’t imperative to the story. They’d be right, but I feel that in a comic book the background is just as important as the foreground as sometimes clues for the future of the story can be hidden within the background. Again if this art style is a creative decision for this book then fair enough, I’d just like to see a bit more detail in the backgrounds. Solid issue all-round.
