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I been readin about you, he tells GL.
I want to know …how come?
!Answer methat,Mr.Green Lantern!
To put it in contemporary terms, this was the moment superheroes got woke.
Adams is proud of the pages message and just as proud of his draughtsmanship.
But that guy is ablackguy.
You have to draw black people different just like you have to draw Asians different.
People are different from one another.
Thats what makes the world good.
Thats what makes the worldgreat.
For him, the creation of the now-famed moment was largely business as usual.
I dont have the luxury of waiting for inspiration, which probably will never come.
Therein lies the dichotomy that powered the creation of a great little piece of the comics canon.
Its artist thought he and his partner had turned a low-selling series into something revolutionary.
But to its writer, it was just another day at the office.
Both men were liberals who grew up without black people in their orbit.
ONeil was born to an Irish-American family in 1939 and reared in St. Louis.
Yknow, they dont have souls!
That was the kind of background I came from.
And then youd go through Harlem and its, What are you doing here,white boy?
And how did that happen?
Excuse me, youre just another guy, right?
But you happen to have darker skin and youre treating me like I put you there.
I did put you there.
That was the reality.
The industry they ended up in wasnt a whole lot better in terms of diversity.
At the dawn of the 70s, comics was still primarily a white mans game.
Depictions of black people on the page were also lacking.
Sure, you had the hypercompetent Black Panther, but he didnt even have his own series.
ONeil wanted to do something different, and Adams was right behind him.
But that doesnt mean they were friends.
Indeed, this now-legendary duo hardly ever met.
Julie edited them, he gave them to Neal, and they took it from there.
Nevertheless, they were a hot item, though ONeil was skeptical about how long the ride would last.
We were the flavors of the week a characterization Neal would disagree with, he says.
Heres where the narrative gets a little dicey.
According to Adams, theGreen Lanternrevival was his idea.
He says he wanted a crack at the emerald-shaded super-gent to prove his mettle.
Whatever the specific chain of events, Schwartz assigned both men to the ailing series and awaited the results.
ONeil mulled the title character over and came to a realization about his essence.
My take on Green Lantern was, he was a kind of cop, he recalls.
He was, in his own way, an Establishment character.
I mean, he wore a uniform, he did what he was told, he answered to bosses.
But for explore that idea, I needed somebody to take the opposite point of view, he says.
Enter Green Arrow, DCs other lime do-gooder.
Oliver was, all of a sudden, putty in the two creators hands.
I could do with his personality whatever I felt needed doing, ONeil says.
But how would he explore that notion?
He chose to pick a topic that was literally close to home.
I was living in a slum, ONeil says.
By contrast, when Adams received ONeils script, he was enraptured.
I couldnt believe it, Adams says, shaking his head with wonder, even now.
It was a fresh, new view.
Adams got to work.
The finished product is as charmingly quaint as it is bluntly didactic.
To his surprise, people start pelting him with garbage.
GA suddenly appears and tells GL to back off.
Green Arrow, Hal says.
GL gets defensive: Youve no cause to yell at me!
I have a job … Idoit!
GA counters by going fullGodwins law: Seems Ive heard that line before … at theNazi war trials!
Thats when the old black man appears and makes hisjaccuse.
Some hideous moral cancer is rotting ourvery souls!
Theres a fine country out there someplace!
Lets go find it!
Oliver declares, hopping in a pickup truck.
The issue was a turning point for the series, and comics as a whole.
The stories were a public sensation, garnering awrite-up in the New YorkTimes(Shazam!
And then, as casually as the whole thing had come together, it dissipated.
But its impact resonated in the years and decades that followed.
Marvelleaps to mind, then leaps right out again).
The legacy of the run that began withGreen LanternNo.
Marvelto the pointed diversity ofLion Forges Catalyst Prime lineup.
Future generations wont lack for opportunities to find out what all the fuss is about.
On the other side of the coin, Adams relishes the way he and his arms-length partner made history.
So we better make them good … dont you think?
