Green Lanterns once had a weakness to the color yellow, with Batman handing Hal Jordan his most humiliating loss thanks to a common building item.
Warning: Spoilers for Batman/Superman: World’s Finest #4!
In DC Comics, staple Justice League members Green Lantern Hal Jordan and Batman have butted heads more than once, and now Bats has revealed he once took Hal down with a well-placed yellow brick! Suffice it to say, a Green Lantern’s outdated weakness to the color yellow never did these cosmic space cops any favors, and of course, Batman never could resist exploiting a good flaw.
Touched on in Batman/Superman: World’s Finest #4, by Mark Waid and Dan Mora, this series has focused on the untold adventures of Batman and Superman well before the current DC Comics continuity. Still in the midst of telling its opening story arc, this series has immediately drawn fans in with gorgeous and colorful art and a script that feels just right for the characters swept up in it, with young versions of Dick Grayson — still clad in Robin attire — and a relatively new-to-the-scene Supergirl only adding to the book’s allure.
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A loss hinted at while Batman and Superman battle a possessed Hal Jordan, it’s not until Superman is nearly taken out by Hal’s newly magically imbued ring that fans are let in on a secret defeat that Hal most certainly doesn’t want anyone to know about. After jumping in front of Superman and deflecting the ring’s beam before Big Blue is incinerated by it, Batman can’t help but comment on their current predicament and sneaks in an off-hand reveal that gives readers a hint as to what may be Green Lantern Hal Jordan’s most humiliating defeat.
Blocking the incoming magic with all his might while Superman recovers, Batman looks back to his partner and says, “I miss the days when you could just knock him out with a yellow brick,” hilariously calling out Hal’s old weakness while simultaneously letting slip that at some point in the past, Batman totally hurled a yellow bat-brick at Hal’s head and put him down for the count. And while it’s not clear if Batman was saving Hal from another possession with said brick or just wanted to shut him up for a second, the fact that Batman is reminiscing on the good old days of the Green Lanterns’ dumbest weakness while also being super specific about his colored weapon of choice, it’s easy to assume Bats is recalling a moment that’s already happened between these two iconic DC heroes.
A weakness that’s as head-scratching as Green Lantern’s equally as odd but thankfully also outdated susceptibility to wood (really, Alan Scott?), Green Lanterns being unable to fight back against the color yellow was eventually revealed to have come from an impurity in the Central Power Battery associated with the avatar of fear, Parallax, an entity that has given the Corps. a lot of grief over the years. And since Batman has plans on top of plans to take down any and all Justice League members should he have to, Bats alluding to a time when he chucked a yellow brick at Hal's noggin to take him down is peak Batman and also shows how getting rid of this ridiculous color weakness was ultimately a good thing for the Green Lantern Corps.
So while the instance in question hasn’t technically been seen on-panel, the idea that Batman apparently once used a yellow-colored brick to take down Hal is as hilarious as it is humiliating. Batman and Green Lantern Hal Jordan don’t always see eye to eye, and now fans have another reason why their Justice League rivalry is so intense.
Next: Green Lantern's Best Weakness Has Been Totally Forgotten by DC
Batman/Superman: World’s Finest #4 is now available from DC Comics.
Brian is first and foremost a nerd in every way shape and form. He likes to compare himself to a black hole, consuming any and every form of entertainment unlucky enough to get caught in his gravitational pull. It's not uncommon on any given day for him to read a couple comics, settle down with a good book, watch a few movies (inside and out of the theater), catch up on his ever growing but never depleting streaming queue, challenge himself with a few good video games, and of course, write his heart out. He spends every waking moment dreaming up interesting and intriguing concepts and ideas that will hopefully one day inspire and entertain anyone looking for an escape from their daily lives. Graduating from Full Sail University in good old humid Florida, Brian currently lives and works in New York City and lives for the day when all he has to do is wake up and create something unique and new for people to enjoy.