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GREEN LANTERN #87 — the substitute who became the star.
Cover-dated January 1972, this issue arrives in the middle of Denny O'Neil and Neal Adams's landmark Green Lantern/Green Arrow run. When an earthquake injures Guy Gardner, Hal Jordan's designated backup, the Guardians need a new substitute Green Lantern for Earth. They choose John Stewart, and comics had not seen anyone quite like him.
Neal Adams's cover makes the introduction without asking permission. John stands over a beaten Hal Jordan, ring blazing: "They whipped the Green Lantern — now let 'em try me!" It's one of the most confident debuts of the Bronze Age, and Adams and Dick Giordano carry that energy through the interiors.
There's more in the 48 pages than the headline. Guy Gardner makes his second appearance in a cameo, the issue carries Elliot S. Maggin's first comics story, and a Green Arrow feature ("What Can One Man Do?") and a classic reprint round it out, all for 25 cents.
Half a century on, the substitute is the lead: Aaron Pierre plays John Stewart opposite Kyle Chandler's Hal Jordan in HBO's Lanterns. This copy grades CGC 4.0, Very Good, with cream to off-white pages. It's an honest mid-grade copy of a key whose Adams cover still lands at arm's length.
CGC 4.0 · Cream to Off-White pages · 1st Appearance John Stewart · O'Neil & Adams · DC, 1972
Ships in a Gemini graded-comic mailer with honeycomb kraft void fill, fully insured, within one business day of cleared payment.
The Memory Shop of Concord — curated Golden, Silver and Bronze Age keys at memoryshopconcord.com
