POP! Heroes: White Lantern Batman

Company: Funko

Year: 2015

Series: POP! Heroes

I’ve mentioned before on here that between late 2006 and early 2008 was my prime time for buying comics. It was a good time to join the scene; DC had just undergone a mini-reboot with Infinite Crisis and a few key titles had relaunched at issue #1.

The seeds were being sown for the next company-wide event – Blackest Night. I dipped out of comic collecting for a variety of reasons just prior to its proper beginning, but I’ve read the odd bits and pieces of it in the years that have followed, and it was (like most of these company-wide crossovers) okay but not amazing. The backstory is far too convoluted to get into here, but let’s assume that you’re familiar-ish with Green Lantern. Remember that oath he recites when he’s charging his ring? Specifically, the line about “Blackest Night”? Well, turns out that wasn’t just some ritualistic hyperbole – Blackest Night was a prophecy of a real, and pretty horrific, event to come.   

And so came the era of the “Rainbow Lanterns” – pretty much every colour got its very own Lantern Corps, including the White Lanterns, who arose to save the DC Universe…or something. I’ve got mixed feelings about the story itself, but it did give us a few cool spins on characters – one of them being this White Lantern Batman.

It’s a repaint; as far as I can tell it’s exactly the same Batman that was released back in 2010 (even though the foot is stamped as “2014”), but with a new coat of paint and some glow-in-the-dark moulding. It’s not to my taste as an everyday look for Batman, but it’s an interesting novelty.  

However this novelty should be slightly tempered. Appropriately, given that it’s an old mould, it has some of the “Old Funko” problems too. The eyes are not quite painted properly and there is some overspill of glue on his left leg where it has been glued in. Your mileage will vary according to the figure you get of course, but make sure you check it carefully in the store.

There are currently three White Lantern POPs available – Superman, The Flash and Batman. Wonder Woman is apparently on the way too (as an SDCC Exclusive in both regular and glow in the dark form). Given that it’s a relatively easy repaint, I’d be surprised if we don’t get a few more Rainbow Lanterns in the future.

   

White Lantern Batman is not essential, but the glow-in-the-dark feature is fun. He doesn’t come highly recommended but he is a cool variant for Batman obsessives.