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In the first version during the Silver Age, in Showcase #22, the Green Lantern was Hal Jordan, a test pilot who was given a power ring by a dying alien, Abin Sur, and who became a member of the [[Green L

Green Lantern has had his origin story retold differently several times over his many years of publication, with significant variations in continuity.

History

Silver Age

In the first version during the Silver Age, in Showcase #22, the Green Lantern was Hal Jordan, a test pilot who was given a power ring by a dying alien, Abin Sur, and who became a member of the Green Lantern Corps, an interstellar organization of police overseen by the Guardians of the Universe. The Corps' rings were powerless against anything colored yellow, due to a necessary impurity in the ring. The Silver Age Green Lantern was unique in several ways.

Showcase 22

The first apperance of Green Lantern.

He was the first DC superhero with a family, like his two brothers, Jack and Jim. His first supporting cast is Carol Ferris, his love interest. She was in charge of Ferris Aircraft, and as such, Hal's boss. While she preferred Green Lantern to Hal Jordan, she took an active role in trying to win him over, even going so far as to propose to him in the old Leap Year tradition. Although she gave Jordan some attention, her job and company always came first. Ferris was a strong-willed woman of authority at a time when this was rare, especially in comic books. The Silver Age Green Lantern had a young Inuit assistant, a aerospace mechanic named Tom Kalmaku, who's also nicknamed Pieface, chronicling his adventures.

Post-Crisis

The Crisis on Infinite Earths ended the Multiverse and streamlined the entire DC Universe into a new continuity. During this time, the character's origin story is re-told and expanded in two limited series by Gerard Jones, Emerald Dawn and Emerald Dawn II. The first series expanded the Corps in his origin and also provided more details about his childhood and his relationship with his father and brothers, while the sequel detailed the role of Jordan in the downfall of Sinestro.

A new account of Green Lantern's origins was released in the (2008) Green Lantern series. In this new origin, Green Lantern: Secret Origin, Hal Jordan, is working as an assistant mechanic under Tom Kalmaku himself, barred from flying due to his insubordination while in the U.S.A.F. and his employers lingering guilt about his father's death in the line of duty, when Abin Sur, fighting Atrocitus of the Five Inversion, crashes near Coast City.


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