Red Lanterns #26 Review

Why so serious, Guy?

Charles Soule continues his amazing run of Red Lanterns with the end of a two-part filler story, through it is filled with some nice emotional beats.

Ratchet and Gensui are the highlights of this issue, so if you like the Red Lantern, this is for you.

The art is still gritty enough for the Red Lantern book, through some faces come off a little bland.

SPOILERS FOLLOW......................

With Zillius Zox is still repairing the Kaalvar, the ship they stole from Barg the pirate, Barg has helped the dictator of Kormorax (a planet on the outside side of sector 2814) capture the Red Lanterns.

In a neuralizer bubble, Guy and his team are sedated and Gensui decides to parade them in front of his docile workers.There are some humorous one-liners here while the Rankorr-Bleez camaraderie continues to make me smile.

Knowing that the last Red Lantern is on the stolen pirate ship, Gensui attacks the ship but Zox is able to crash the ship into the stadium, destroying the neuralizer bubble.

But before that, Ratchet is able to regain his rage (which has been hinted at since the first panel where they were captured) and protects the other Lanterns from the gunfire. But the wounds are fatal and he dies.

Ratchet has always been the most loyal of all Red Lanterns and so was faithful to Atrocitus, guarding the Red Battery diligently. When Guy came, he was the first to call for his death but in the last few issues, he learnt that life could have meaning beyond rage and this caused his 'righteous' rage to abate. So, while he would have died soon anyway, he was able to find real friends and died stopping an injustice.

R.I.P Ratchet.

Bleez is able to torture talk Gensui into ordering the soldiers to back down and then kills him with her wings.

Elsewhere on Goswan, Atrocitus and Dex-Starr have come face-to-face with the newest Red Lantern Itro. Dex Starr forms a construct of a creature like Itro and distracts him while Atrocitus enters his ears and kills him from the inside, finally receiving a Red Lantern ring.

Things do not look good for Guy Gardner.

SPOILERS END.......................

There is nothing more to say. If you've been reading Red Lanterns before Soule, you would know how much he transformed this book into something special. And Soule himself is one of the premier writers in comics right now.

With great art, this is a must read book.

So, I give it 8.5 out of 10

+Great character work
+Some amazing visuals
+Great plot pacing

-Too much filler