Post-film plans for Green Lantern

There are now three major projects planned for the Green Lantern property after this summer’s hopeful blockbuster.

Last year, we got a bit of test footage and description of the new Green Lantern: The Animated Series at New York Comic Con, and yesterday we got the first in-show footage of the program in the form of a 7-second promo spot shown on Cartoon Network. The footage that made it onto the internet is just a crappy recording off of the television, but it gives us as good a look as we’ve had of the series, for those who were not at the Comic Con:

It’s hard to tell if it’s just the quality of the recording, but the footage is not impressive. The CGI looks overly simplistic and under-stylized, like it comes from a development period somewhere between Reboot and Clone Wars. Hopefully, Cartoon Network puts this up online somewhere soon, so that we can get a better look at it. I’m also hoping that the music in the background has nothing to do with the show, perhaps a bleed-over from another program, or the music for the series of clips all from a new line-up, because if that music reflects the attitude of the new show, We’ll have some true garbage on our hands.

Looking much better is the new animated movie, Emerald Knights. This is the follow-up - though not a sequel - to First Flight, which was outstanding. The style and tone of that movie was exactly what modern fans are looking for, hitting on the feel of the animated series from the 90’s. The new film has even added geek-favorite Nathan Fillion to do the voice of Hal Jordan. This looks more like what I want to see as an animated series, and while I’m looking forward to the feature, I know it’s just going to make me wish that the series could be more like this:

Green Lantern: Rise of the Manhunters is the video game tie-in with the film. Not much has been announced about the plot of the video game, or how closely it will follow the film, but we do know that it will feature a variety of ring constructs with which to battle the Manhunters, a free-flying non-linearity of level design, and a co-operative mode, in which players can team up with pre-yellow Sinestro. It will be released just after the film on the major consoles, including the 3DS.