The first volume shows Hal, an asteroid miner for Ferris Galactic who doesn't want to return to Earth, discover an alien ring that belonged to a deceased member of the long-scattered Green Lantern Corps, and his subsequent struggle as part of the fight against the robotic Manhunters who have subjugated the aliens he meets afterwards.
Volume 2 released on August 11th, 2020, and introduced John Stewart.
Provides examples off:
- Adaptational Heroism:
- Sinestro isn't the creator of the Yellow Lanterns. While he has major disagreements with how the Green Lanterns are operating and shows some Knight Templar tendencies, he's not as ruthless as his mainstream counterpart. He also goes along with the Guardians' demand that the Green Lanterns switch to yellow power rings solely out of desperation.
- The Qwardians are not the villainous Always Chaotic Evil Weaponers they are in regular comics. Here, they follow the Last Guardian's orders out of debt to him and Volume 2 ends with Hal becoming their hero and protector in their home dimension.
- Adaptational Job Change: Hal Jordan is an astronaut in this continuity instead of a test pilot.
- Adaptational Nationality: John Stewart is an American architect and former Marine in the comics, here he's a Canadian engineer.
- Adaptation Relationship Overhaul: While Abin Sur usually survives long enough to pass on his ring to Hal, here he died centuries ago and Hal takes the ring from his mummified corpse.
- Adaptational Villainy: Zigzagged. It's actually unclear how good or bad, or how responsible, the Guardians were. The last living one first looks to good to dispel those notions, but indeed turns out to be malevolent. His status as the last one as well as confirming that he is not Krona shows that he is likely a version of Ganthet, who is usually the Big Good of the Green Lantern mythos.
- Adaptational Wimp: Subverted. The Green Lanterns aren't nearly as formidable as they are usually depicted, but that's because the Manhunters have blocked them off from the main power battery on Oa, meaning the rings have to be powered by residual green energy traces lingering through space.
- Adaptation Distillation: Volume 2 combines plot elements of Sinestro Corps War and Zero Hour: Crisis in Time!.
- Adaptation Name Change:
- Ferris Air/Ferris Aircraft has become Ferris Galactic.
- Kilowog is given what appears to be a surname, Ev.
- Adaptation Personality Change:
- Hal is normally a Ace Pilot, Military Maverick with a positive outlook and a sense of humor. Here he's a jaded former-NASA employee who has a cynical view of his home planet, not wanting to ever leave space. He gets a bit better as he grows into his role as a Green Lantern, becoming altruistic for the universe's sake.
- Kilowog is a descendant of a former Green Lantern who inherited the ring, is a rather friendly scientist instead of a Drill Sergeant Nasty (He in fact wanted Hal to teach him since he had such raw natural talent before Hal explained that he needed Kilowog to teach him more about the ring), and doesn't have any angst about the Last of His Kind since his race is still around, even if he doesn't have the best relationship with their military.
- Arisia is the only protector her people have and is a harsh militant type who decries Hal as a Naïve Newcomer for thinking the Green Lanterns could fight back against the Manhunters. At the end she's made the new leader of the reformed Green Lantern Corps, quite the far cry from being a childish rookie.
- Age Lift: Abin Sur, Hal's predecessor, died centuries ago in a battle with the Manhunters.
- A.I. Is a Crapshoot: Zigzagged. The Manhunters are definitely villainous, but may have been programmed that way. Though if that part is true is ambiguous.
- Ascended Extra: Sinestro takes on a more major role in Volume 2, spearheading many of the Green Lanterns' defection to the Yellow Lanterns.
- Beard of Sorrow: Inverted. The cynical and jaded Hal Jordan is clean-shaven in the beginning, but the heroic and idealistic Jordan in the end has a full beard.
- Big Bad:
- The Manhunters in Volume 1.
- The Last Guardian in Volume 2.
- The Cameo: Sinestro and Salaak don't play significant roles, but both briefly appear and have one incidental line each.
- Composite Character:
- Hal Jordan shares Kyle Rayner's role as the last surviving human Green Lantern.
- The last Guardian takes Sinestro and the Anti-Monitor's roles as the founders and leaders of the Yellow Lanterns as well as Krona who was a separate character in this verse.
- Crapsack World: Thanks to the Manhunters, the whole universe (or at least the parts Hal is introduced to) has it pretty rough. They killed almost all of the Green Lanterns, have driven entire civilizations into hiding, and have implemented slave labor on Oa. After the Green Lanterns destroy a good deal of them, they set out to make things better.
- Earth also seems to be headed in this direction, with culture stagnated and very bad people having seized power through duplicitous means. Though if the other Earth One books are indeed set in a Shared Universe with this series, then this may be a case of Depending on the Writer.
- Darker and Edgier: Like a good deal of the Earth One series, this has some darker elements and tone. That said, the first volume ends on a pretty hopeful note. The artwork even gets more colorful after the rather bleakly colored beginning of the story, likely meant to symbolize the reemergence of the the Green Lanterns.
- Decomposite Character:
- Abin Sur has already died by the time Hal Jordan comes across his remains and obtains his power ring, with Kilowog instead being the one to provide Hal with exposition regarding the Green Lantern Corps and how the power ring works.
- Sinestro still becomes affiliated with the Yellow Lanterns, but is no longer their founder. The Yellow Lanterns here are formed by the last Guardian.
- Evil All Along: The last Guardian who appears to Hal to give him advice that ends up leading to the main power battery being freed and bringing the Green Lanterns back to their previous strength didn't want that to happen at all. He actually wanted to set up Hal to kill all the Green Lanterns along with the Manhunters so he could send his new Yellow Lanterns to take their place in the universe.
- Gondor Calls for Aid: With his ring super-charged by the Oan Power Battery, Hal sends a distress signal across the universe to anybody wielding a ring to help him. They come.
- Good Is Not Nice: The Bolovax Vik's military. Despite having issues with Kilowog and wanting to either capture Hal or remove him from the planet, they put that aside due to the threat of the Manhunters.
- Arisia isn't particularly nice either, looking down on and threatening to kill Hal and Kilowog. That said, she's honored when Hal nominates her to be the leader of the reforming Green Lantern Corps.
- Greater-Scope Villain: The last Guardian in Volume 1.
- General Jask on Earth.
- Hope Bringer: Hal, which is ironic given how aloof he was at the beginning.
- Humans by Any Other Name:
- Downplayed example, but due to Hal answers Kilowog's questions, he takes to calling humans "earth-humans", since Hal felt the need to clarify that he was from Earth before saying he was human.
- The last remaining Guardian calls Hal "Haroldjordan".
- I Have No Idea What I'm Doing: Hal gives the ring of a fallen Lantern to a random alien, but admits to Kilowog that he's not sure if said alien will be up for the task or not.
- Les Collaborateurs: The Global Central Command under General Jask was working with the Yellow Lanterns in orchestrating the attack on the Llaran envoy ship and framing Earth's governments, thereby allowing the Yellow Lanterns to neutralize the planet's military forces and granting Jask to rule Earth with the backing of the Yellow Lanterns. After the Guardian's death and the Yellow Lanterns disbanding, Jask doesn't have enough power to remain in control and is forced into hiding when different factions went against the Global Central Command.
- Made a Slave: Hal, after his ring loses its power, is captured by the Manhunters and forced to work as a slave miner alongside many other aliens. They fail to take the ring from him and once it recharges, Hal leads to a lot of problems for them.
- Mythology Gag:
- The Qwardians' unnamed oppressors heavily resemble the Anti-Monitor.
- Krona is mentioned as having accidentally birth the multiverse with a experiment to see the origins of the universe.
- No Name Given: The Guardian is never given a name, though it's heavily implied he is Ganthet being given a major case of Adaptational Villainy.
- Not Wearing Tights: Hal's outfit consists of his Ferris Galactic spacesuit with a glowing Lantern emblem. Apparently here the ring does not automatically generate the GLC uniform, so most of the Green Lantern outfits we see are makeshift, with the classic uniform only appearing on Abin Sur's corpse and in flashbacks.
- Only the Chosen May Wield: Averted as here the Green Lantern rings lack their usual restrictions and can be used by anyone.
- Perma-Stubble: Hal doesn't shave during the events he goes through, so by the end of Volume One he has a full beard.
- Remember the New Guy?: Volume Two introduces Carol Ferris and she and Hal are already well acquainted with each other, despite having no mention in the first volume apart from Ferris Galactic.
- Sequel Hook:
- Besides promises of more adventures of Hal as a Green Lantern, one of the endings of the book includes the last Guardian creating a new Corps with yellow rings.
- Volume 2 ends with the reveal that Hal survived the collapse of the dimensional rift, and has become the protector of Qward with the new name of "Guardian".
- Shooting Superman: After a botched arrest attempt, soldiers firing on Hal stop once they realize they're just wasting ammunition on someone who can erect bulletproof force fields.
- Spared by the Adaptation: Bolovax Vik, along with Kilowog's entire people, are alive in the end, when standard continuity has them wiped out with Kilowog being the Last of His Kind.
- Superhero Paradox: News reports point out that the threats Hal is protecting Earth from are all only coming to Earth to come for him.
- Translator Microbes: The rings have this ability, just like before. When the ring runs out of charge, Hal is unable to understand Kilowog or anyone else.
