Ganthet and Sayd Are Exiled

The story

As the Sinestro Corps War raged, two voices on Oa refused to stay silent. Ganthet and Sayd — Guardians who had dared to feel, to love one another — acknowledged what their brethren would not: that the forbidden prophecy of the Blackest Night, written in the Book of Oa, was coming to pass. When the other Guardians voted to burn those pages, Ganthet and Sayd tried to stop them. For the crime of "acting on emotion," the Guardians exiled them both.

It was the most consequential banishment in Corps history. Ganthet used his last moments on Oa to reveal the Blackest Night prophecy to Hal Jordan, Guy Gardner, John Stewart, and Kyle Rayner: "Elsewhere, a flicker of hope will shine from deep space, like a lighthouse warning the ships away from the rocks." Then the two exiles settled on the garden world of Odym — and did what the Guardians never could. They forged the first blue power ring, weaponizing hope itself against the coming darkness.

Their first recruit was Saint Walker, a priest of Astonia, and the Blue Lantern Corps was born — the living proof that the Guardians' exile had backfired. Ganthet and Sayd would later offer Hal Jordan leadership of their Corps and forge an alliance with the Indigo Tribe, all in preparation for the night the dead would rise. The Guardians cast out their most compassionate members; the universe gained its most hopeful ones.

“Blue Lantern Corps” profile — Blackest Night #0 (Free Comic Book Day, 2009), reprinted in Tales of the Corps #1. Doug Mahnke (profile pencils); Tom Nguyen (profile inks); Nei Ruffino (profile colors). Artwork source & details.

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