I just saw the movie today. At first I thought that I should go in with lowered expectations, given all the scathing reviews of the movie. Then I gave that a second thought. I definitely wasn't going to see the movie with great expectations, but I wouldn't go in with lowered expectations either. No, I would see it with the same expectations that I would hold any movie to. It's important for fans to uphold their standards. If Green Lantern sucked, then I would call it like it is and say that it sucked.
But after watching the movie, I have to say that I am REALLY surprised at how low the Rotten Tomatoes score is. Don't get me wrong, Green Lantern was by no means a great film. But a 25% RT score? Really? I've always thought that the RT scores have been pretty fair when it comes to modern superhero movies. But the negative reactions toward this movie have been too strong, IMO. This was NOWHERE near as bad as Ghost Rider or the two Fantastic Four movies, all of which have it beat in RT score. I'd easily hold this movie over Spider-Man 3, which has it beaten quite handily with a 63% score. Both GL and SM3 are so-so movies that squander the grandeur of their source materials, but SM3 was a structural mess far beyond any of GL's own screwups.
Overall, GL is a simple popcorn movie that kept me entertained, and cleanly passed through its running time. I've seen plenty of horrible movies. Movies that had crappy RT scores in the 30s-40s, which were STILL far above GL's terrible 25%. GL is NOT one of those movies. It didn't have any characters who were so annoying that I wanted to punch them every time they came onscreen. The movie didn't jump from one soulless and hyperactive action scene to the next, nor did it slow to a tedious, talky crawl. The plot mostly held together - not a hard thing since it was so simple and straightforward. GL is totally forgettable, but it was also pretty harmless entertainment to me. It's the type of movie that I think should've gotten a RT score in the 50s or 60s.
I want to stand up for the cast, because I think they're going to be unfairly maligned for this movie. The actors were all solid if not good in their roles.
Ryan Reynolds was a suitable hero, and much more of a Hal Jordan than he looked in that first trailer which made him look like a cross between Ryan Reynolds, Van Wilder, and Tony Stark lite. Sure he was portrayed as irresponsible in the beginning, but the character was not the overly sarcastic jokester that I was afraid he might be.
I thought Peter Sarsgaard was really good as Hector Hammond. I know nothing about the comic book version of the character, so I'm judging him based only on what was shown in this movie. Hector was well written and acted. The guy is a total nerdy creep, but also sympathetic. The lines, and Sarsgaard's acting, really conveyed his awkwardness, obsession, shame, jealousy, and introverted anger without coming out and stating those things.
Mark Strong was a good Sinestro, both acting wise as well as physically (for what little he got to do in this movie). Geoffrey Rush and Michael Clarke Duncan's voice acting as other Green Lanterns was also pretty good.
Overall, this movie was not bad at all and its cast was quite acceptable. My biggest fear was that this movie might not just fail, but be SO bad that there would be nothing to salvage and continue on with in sequels or a possible future Justice League movie. That is not the case here. While this movie didn't blow me away, I would be perfectly fine with this cast, and this universe returning in (better) future movies.
SPOILERS
So what went wrong? Well, as many people have said, this movie plays it safe. It wasn't as by-the-numbers as I feared, but it also didn't do very much to stand out either.
The way the villains were handled could've been better too. Not Hector - I thought he was great and wanted to see more of him. He had his own story which was solid and could've been expanded upon, but was unfortunately only tenuously connected to the main conflict. It wasn't right how Hector was so suddenly killed off so that the movie could end with Parallax.
Speaking of Parallax, he could've been way better. Again I'm no expert on GL lore, but even skimming through Parallax's Wikipedia article he seems like a much grander villain than this. The ancient, living embodiment of fear, not just a Guardian gone bad. I'd totally sympathize with any fan who was let down at how Parallax was portrayed, even if it didn't affect me personally. To be fair, the way the movie handled things allows for a future movie to easily fix things by saying that that Guardian had been merely possessed by the real Parallax. And there are hints of the villain's true power. The entire SECTOR of space where he had been imprisoned was deemed "lost," entire worlds were destroyed, and the Guardians feared a direct attack on Oa itself. But it all ended with a brief attack on Earth that was too small in scale, which Hal stopped himself. They could've easily written in an epic battle between Parallax and the entire Corps.
The script was actually decent, and the dialogue was even nuanced and quite sharp in some areas. But I will have to say that this movie was RUSHED. Without knowing anymore, I'd even say that it seems like a lot of scenes have been cut out, given GL's relatively short 1 hour, 45 minute running time. That's about 15-25 minutes shorter than quite a few other films in the superhero blockbuster genre. And the jumps are quite jarring. Several examples:
1) Hal intervenes during Hector's rampage at that secret government facility, with no explanation of how he even knows that something was going on there.
2) Despite having all of one meeting with Sinestro before (when Sinestro was kicking his butt during training), Hal just shows up on Oa and protests about giving in to the temptation to use of fear. No scene where Hal even learns about the yellow ring.
3) Hal returns to Earth and flies directly to that Ferris hangar, where Hector is holding Carol hostage. We don't see her abduction, or Hal learning about it.
The movie's structure mostly holds together, even though it feels like pieces have been pulled out from it. These "missing" scenes are all straightforward and wouldn't have taken much time at all, and GL would've been a better movie had they been included.
The yellow ring was probably the worst part of this movie, and felt shoehorned in by the writers just because they "have" to set up Sinestro's fall into evil. Let me get this straight: the Corps is threatened by Parallax, a former Guardian who tried to use the evil yellow light of fear and was instead seduced by it. So their solution is to risk it and have EVERYONE give the yellow light a try, even though Parallax had not yet battled more than a dozen Green Lanterns (out of thousands) at once? It's stupid, jumping the gun, and not even an intuitive reaction.
Sinestro's dissatisfaction with the Guardians was hinted at quite well in a few scenes, but the movie never portrayed any conflict developing so badly that he would turn to evil. The post-credits scene of Sinestro putting on the yellow ring made no sense, and was just a mindless attempt to please the fans. Why would Sinestro put that thing on, after the Parallax crisis had ended and he himself had even agreed with Hal that fear was not the way?
Overall, this movie wasn't great but it did its job as lightweight summer entertainment. I can't understand the extremely bad reviews that it's gotten. On a scale of 1 to 10, I'd probably give this a 6 or 6.5. The movie could've easily been a 7, had it taken its time with several more scenes.
