Some of you know me already. Alternatively, some of you know or care about the Red Lantern Corps, or in particular, the character Bleez

In either case, you will have seen my past blog, and will know how I have been feeling about this situation. Otherwise, STOP READING THIS because you won't get it, go read this instead! Then come back here because I'm not DONE with you yet. You'll damn well sit down and you'll read this and you'll listen and you'd better CARE, or I'll find you.

*taps foot* Are you done yet? Good, now go onward.

So as you know, Bleez has been reduced to arm-candy levels by DC, when she isn't being outright EVIL. Yeah, that's right -- since my rant on #16, #17-18 have been giving Bleez about a single panel per issue. What is she using those panels to do? THREATEN THE LIVES OF INNOCENT PEOPLE OUT OF SPITE.

Yeah, that's right. The vengeance-driven, bloodthirsty, but generally decent Red Lantern and rape victim isn't doing anything helpful to the plot. All she's doing is terrorizing Rankorr by stalking him and hunting down a DEFENSELESS WOMAN.

Yeah. A defenseless, innocent woman.

So far, this will sound like I don't like Bleez. I don't want to give that impression.

I HATE HER. I CAN'T STAND HER. Or more specifically, I can't stand the hateful doppleganger that has taken the place of one of my very favorite characters, who, while previously very angry and hurt, had a sense of pride and dignity, and served the cause of the Corps by hunting down the guilty and keeping the other Red Lanterns in order.

NOT BY TERRORIZING INNOCENT HUMANS, in an attempt to SEDUCE Rankorr into giving her the powers she ALWAYS HAD BEFORE THE REBOOT TOOK THEM AWAY.

So, I've been constantly on the fence with this. Hoping that the genuinely enjoyable and satisfying story that was taking place within Red Lanterns #0-12 would someday return, I held out, suffered through the Third Army. Now I've been suffering through the First Lantern, and good God it's been absolutely terrible in every respect.

But look! A light in the distance! Could it be... a new writer? Taking over the project at #20? Why, it's everything I've always asked for, always hoped for since Milligan suddenly went bonkers and started making the entire title a big Rankorr wank-off in addition to some suddenly horribly-written Atrocitus (yay for tired plot points -- yes, his planet was destroyed!).

I was excited. I was so excited. Some rumors of Guy Gardner joining (or, from the sounds of it, usurping) the corps had me a little bit uneasy but I kept high hopes.

Until this morning, when I saw this.

Ladies and gentlemen, the solicit for Red Lanterns #22.

"Guy Gardner has suddenly found himself at the top of the Red Lantern food chain—but in a pack of bloodthirsty animals like these, everyone’s a predator! If he wants their respect, he’s gonna need the nastiest piece of work in the Corps on his side… but Bleez has her own ideas about what Guy Gardner’s got coming to him!"

Where do I begin?

Let's start with constructs. Bleez has had a major hard-on for Rankorr's constructs (WHICH SHE ALWAYS HAD BEFORE THEY WERE TAKEN AWAY, AND GIVEN ONLY TO RANKORR), and was more than willing to spread her legs to get them (WHICH IS STUPID AND OUT OF CHARACTER. It says horrible things about rape victims and women in general, it's crude and awful and distasteful and just... just... TERRIBLE). From that cover, considering by the oh-so-creative hardlight combat knife in her hand (that's the brutal combat tactician I've come to love! A knife!), it looks like, whether by hook, crook, or orifice, she's managed to get them.

Despite having always had them in the past.

Yay.

How about the fact that now she's kissing Guy Gardner? Now, they actually kissed once before, in Emerald Warriors -- SORT OF. They mashed lips so that he could drink some of her blood-vomit and therefore go full-Red so he could save the day. That's story-telling, I have no problem with that. None at all.

This, on the other hand, is STUPID.

The solicit clearly states that he needs to "get her on his side" (by having sex with her, apparently -- I know that always works for me), and yet she has "her own ideas". Not that it's stopping her from going for a frenchie on the cover. Yay, yet another instance of a badass female character being nothing more than arm candy for the male hero, and/or using sex to get what she wants.

Because that's the only power women actually have, right? Screw power rings, they have vaginas and can make (much stronger and more efficient) men do whatever they want FOR them, so they don't need to do anything.

Yeah, Bleez has always been a cold-hearted, ambitious, and capricious character. It's what I love about her. But part of that cold-heartedness includes her not going down like an asthmatic 12-year-old at a Black Friday sale. She's better than that. She turned down a chance to join the Star Sapphires because, and I quote, "stick your love"

So, stick your love, literally? Stick it right up in her if it gets her what she wants? What does she even want in this scenario?

I'm done with this title, possibly forever. I held out hope for a new writer and this is what DC gave me, after a continuous stream of rapid, unending kicks to my shins, baby-toes, and other sensitive areas. So I'm out. They can take their character-ruining and misogynistic ways and keep them. Unless things seriously change with the title and DC in general, I will never buy another issue of this book.