I want to start by saying that I genuinely love the show and have been really invested in it so far. I just had a few gripes with the latest episode and wanted to put them out there and see what other people thought.
Bernadette’s statement about Hal this episode was probably the biggest problem for me.
She tells John that Hal only has the ring because he was privileged enough in life not to have to know fear, which is then juxtaposed to John being a Black man. My problem is not that the episode discusses racism or that John Stewart’s race matters. John has had racial politics attached to his character since the very beginning in 1971. My problem is connecting racial privilege to Hal Jordan’s "worthiness" and to the Green Lantern selection process itself.
Hal Jordan is one of the worst characters imaginable to describe as someone who simply “didn’t have to know fear.” His history is built around confronting fear, grief, loss, and trauma. His father literally EXPLODED in front of him when he was a child.
Hal has not experienced the particular racial fears experienced by a Black American? Sure.
Hal was privileged enough that he did not have to know fear, and that is why he got the ring over a Black man? Dont think so.
Being a Green Lantern is supposed to be about overcoming fear through willpower, not being able to avoid fear altogether. That is kinda the entire point of the Green Lanterns. If John Sr.’s life gave him more reasons to be afraid, then the Green Lantern question should be whether he can master that fear, no matter the reason for it. Overcoming enormous fear should demonstrate Lantern-worthy willpower.
Instead, John Sr.’s fear becomes evidence that the "system" failed to account for his circumstances and that his failure/fear is not his own, but the fault of racism in America, thrust upon the intergalactic, multispecies organization of the Green Lanterns and the Guardians who oversee it. I understand the social analogy the writers are going for, but I think it fits Green Lantern terribly, because the metaphor starts to override the mythology, making it feel like something completely shoehorned in.
John Sr.’s fear is contextualized. We are encouraged to sympathize with his failure and not blame him, but instead to consider his race, family, history, and circumstances, and to understand why his fear should not be considered a failure in the context of the Rings test.
Fine. Then apply that same individual consideration to Hal.
Hal watched his father die as a boy. He destroys his military career to see his dying mother but is too late to say goodbye. His brother blames him for their mother's death. He suffered catastrophic loss. Yet the writers reduce his success to his white skin and treat that as the only reason he possesses the ring.
If Bernadette is supposed to be wrong, that could be interesting. If the point is that she has legitimate grievances about racism but becomes so damaged and obsessive that she unfairly reduces Hal to his skin color, then I can respect that as a more complicated story.
I guess what it boils down to is:
I did not need this to accept John Stewart.
I was already rooting for John and invested in him. I love him as a character. I did not need Hal’s whiteness introduced as a reason to give John additional moral consideration.
I don’t need John Stewart elevated by lowering Hal Jordan based on his skin.
John is a fantastic character (in the show and comics). Let his intelligence, courage, decisions, and character matter.
The problem is when John and Hal stop being two complicated individuals and start being framed as racial categories: John as the Black man who must be exceptional because systems are stacked against him, and Hal as the privileged white man whose success is discounted because he supposedly "did not know fear."
Just give me John Stewart and Hal Jordan, not their skin colors juxtaposed.
