Justice League – In Blackest Night (Pt. 1 & 2)

Green Lantern is accused of destroying a heavily populated planet.

Episode #05 – In Blackest Night, Part 2
Original Airdate – November 26th, 2001

Green Lantern stands trial, convinced he was responsible for a planet’s destruction, the Justice League arrive to find the real culprit.

Media by Bird Boy
Review by The Flash

Voices:
Maria Canals as Hawkgirl
Phil LaMarr as Green Lantern
Carl Lumby as J’onn J’onzz
George Newbern as Superman
Michael Rosenbaum as Flash
James Remar as Lead Manhunter
Kurtwood Smith as Prosecutor
Rene Auberjonois as Kanjar-Ro
Dennis Haysbert as Killowog
Garrett Morris as Al McGee
Peter Renaday as Graz
Brian George as Forian
Ricky D’shon Collins as Kid
 

Plot / Story: ****
Dialogue: ***1/2
Voices: ***3/4
Animation: ***
Music: ****
Overall: ***3/4

Plot / Story: First of all, let me just say that I don’t know a lot about the Green Lanterns. I know the basic stuff, but it’s not like
I’m a hardcore Green Lantern guy. So, I won’t get too detailed about that kinda stuff. Batman and Wonder Woman are not featured in this episode, which doesn’t really bother me too much. Batman would not have fit in this story very well, but I don’t understand why Wonder Woman wasn’t in it. Animation cost, maybe? Towards the end of the second episode, Flash and Green Lantern were forced inside a dome (that’s what
I’m going to call it) to be executed. What I want to know is why didn’t
Flash vibrate through it? He headed towards the door as it was closing but that was it. (and if he was going to do that why didn’t he run?)
Either they didn’t give him vibrating powers for the entire series (which would make no sense) or the writer completely forgot about it.
Also, maybe they wanted Superman to save them both?

Dialogue: The Manhunter’s dialogue got tiring after a while, but what do I have to complain about? They’re robots. J To me the dialogue was no where near as good as Secret Origins, BTAS, STAS, etc. It didn’t seem as smooth. Had more bumps in the road ,so to say. I can’t quite put my finger on it, but it did seem slightly off.

Voices: George Newbern has taken a lot of heat from a lot of people. Yes, folks, he’s not Tim Daly, get over it. Cut the poor guy some slack. I think he is doing an excellent job. His voice isn’t as deep as Daly’s was when he talks, but when he grunt she sounds almost like Daly. If not just like him. For my Superman sound bite I recorded him grunting, go take a peek and hear for yourself what I mean. Phil
Lamar improved quite a bit from Secret Origins. He portrayed John
Stewert better in this episode. Or maybe, that’s just cause his style is growing on me? Check out my Green Lantern sound clip and see what you think of it. Ina few spots there is still some work to do, but he’s certainly not horrible. Like I said in my Secret Origins review, it’s almost as if he is trying too hard. Rene Auberjonois as Kanjar-Ro was probably as good as it gets for his character. His raspy voice was perfect, I thought. All of the Green Lanterns were cast perfectly!
Dennis Haysbert as Killowog fit the character very, very well. Not much to complain about here except Al McGee’s Grandchild. His voice seemed to aggravate the heck out of me. I can’t quite put my finger on it for sure. Maybe it was because he sounded too old, and the accent seemed fake. So I took 1/4 of a star off of my ‘Voices’ rating.

Animation: There were times when this was dead on perfect but at other times was lacking. The biggest problem I spotted was with the
Manhunters. Their shading moved around a lot. Their facial features didn’t seem right either. I noticed when John Stewart was in the barber shop talking to Al McGee his shading moved from one side of his head to the other. Not a major mistake, but it was one. The action scenes were where the animation really shined. Especially when Hawkgirl picked a fight with the Green Lanterns. I noticed in the background there were a lot of characters that previously appeared in the Superman: The Animated
Series episode; The Main Man. Flash’s animation wasn’t near as good as it was in Secret Origins, but it was slightly better then in his STAS appearance. It was back to the old, I’m running fast in slow motion look. Overall the animation was much, much better in part II.

Music: This was an improvement from Secret Origins. For instance, when John Stewart is strolling down his old hometown, the music really fit the mood of the scene. During the action scenes the music came off very well, I thought. All around, the music didn’t seem as cheesy as in
Secret Origins.

To sum it all up: It was cool to see the Green Lantern Guardians again, and it was also a treat to see them in action. The character development is moving along very well, and I can’t wait for the next episode.