Following the underwhelming response to the “Green Lantern” panel at the San Diego Comic-Con, Warner Bros. has released the first promo art for the 2011 blockbuster, via RopeofSilicon. It’s such a mishmash of unruly ad concepts that we don’t know where to start, and we can hear the derisive laughter from the halls of Marvel Studios from here.
First off, we hate character banners, but we can understand using them for comic book characters. Still, is anyone going to care who Blake Lively is playing? Mark Strong, never a big draw for any movie, is stuck looking like someone was trying to photoshop a joke-poster for a Muppets action film. And did anyone tell these guys that despite playing a few villains in his career, there’s never ever ever ever ever been ANYTHING intimidating about Peter Sarsgaard’s namby-pamby stare of death? Poor Ryan Reynolds thinks he’s the lead in a star-studded film, but instead, he’s saddled with the lamest ensemble for any superhero picture since “Fantastic Four,” and this poster only serves to highlight that fact.
And of course it’s one of those multi-part posters, the ones that make theater employees feel like they’re at Aunt Mabel’s and surrounded by those giant four-piece puzzles left behind by her grandkids. The whole thing is linked by the Green Lantern mantra, “In Brightest Day, In Blackest Night, No Evil Shall Escape My Sight.” As one of the earliest aspects of the Lantern mythos, the phrase stands out as over-the-top and campy, which wouldn’t be such a bad thing if this poster, which follows a standard superhero film template, wasn’t so dead serious and fixated on badass posturing, all caked in that sickening radiation-tinged neon green we saw on the ‘work-in-progress’ photo from the “Entertainment Weekly” cover.
We want to be excited about this property, but everything that felt right about Marvel’s development of the similar “Iron Man” feels wrong here. DC could have issued some damage control by following the Con with news about the next “Batman” or “Superman” or even confirmation of the “Wonder Woman” rumors, but instead, this eyesore. “Green Lantern” hits theaters June 17th, 2011.