Three of my kids took me to see GREEN LANTERN last night for Fathers Day on $5 Movie Night -- every Monday is $5 all day.  We splurged on 3D ($8.50) -- this was actually the first 3D movie that I thought was worth the bother with the glasses.

I loved the movie.  The kids loved the movie.  While being steeped in comicology, it still had an easy-to-follow plot laced together with propulsive action scenes.  It was obvious that they spent a ton on SFX, and the movie did look fabulous.  I was initially skeptical on what they planned to do with the GL suit, but it looked very organic, impressive and fabulous and they at least attempted to address the awkward domino mask and dispense with it as much as they could.  The lantern power visualizations were surprisingly complex -- more so than in the comics -- and it all fittingly came down to a tried-and-true make-em-smile boxing glove in the end.  The GL Corps was equally off-the-hook, a nice job on them and Oa was fabulous. 

As expected, this rendition of Green Lantern had Geoff Johns formation all over it.  And Johns' GL themes on fear/courage/will were explored and developed.  In fact, they had to be in order to address the 'How does a rookie become the greatest GL?' question.  Johns' Hal/Carol childhood back story was used with good effect.  His take on Hector Hammond creepily living through Hal's thought experiences was used, as well.  The Sinestro subplot was a home run, a fitting setup for a sequel -- which you would think would be 'Sinestro Corps War' in a perfect world.

Using the successful comic book movie template of trying to make each character/supporting character recognizable and pop off the screen largely worked here.  The actors who played Hal, Carol, Hammond and Sinestro all turned in great approximations of iconic characters -- and in some cases (Carol by Blake Lively) exceeded the comic book character.

GREEN LANTERN was a good movie and exceeded my expectations as far as scope, content and suspension of disbelief.  The money they spent on it definitely showed up on the screen.