Welcome back to Waiting on the Trade, a monthly comics book club for people who don’t have time for monthly comics!

In this episode, guest host Simon Payne takes us on a tour of the early-2000s DC Universe, as we discuss the Brian K Vaughan-helmed miniseries Green Lantern: Circle of Fire.

This episode’s explanations, observations, and links of note include:

• What even are Firestorm’s powers? After reading six paragraphs on Wikipedia, I’m more confused.
• DO NOT BUY The DC Universe by Brian K Vaughan if you want the complete Circle of Fire epic. Turns out, it collects only the BKV-penned portions (which does give you the bookends and the Adam Strange issue, which is the best stuff).
• Trevor McCarthy’s art has gotten much better over the course of the last 17 years, to the point where I’m excited to pick up Nightwing: The New Order.
• If you’ve never watched the “Tuvix” episode of Star Trek: Voyager, you really should.
• At this point, we have to talk about fridging. And what the heck, let’s get Hal’s Emerald Advancement Team (H.E.A.T.) out of the way, too. Both foreshadowed changes to come in the superhero comic industry.
• On a lighter note: the Crab Mask – great or terrible? I understand Simon’s comparison to Bionicle masks.
• Congrats, Identity Crisis, you ruined another page of comics. (Women in Refrigerators didn’t save us from that one, unfortunately.)
• Green Lightning, in the second bookend.
• Hitman is a very good series in which Kyle Rayner is (also) slow on the uptake.
• I gave up tagging Circle of Fire authors and artists on this post somewhere in the mid-teens. For the full creative roster, click over to the DC Fandom wiki.
• And finally, if you are an editor who was involved in pitching this series, I would love to know how and why this thing got made (I already searched for interviews). It’s such a niche/weird concept for a miniseries.

Follow-Up Recommendations

If you liked Green Lantern: Circle of Fire (which is nearly unfindable online), we think you might also like:

• JLA: Tower of Babel.
• Green Lantern: Rebirth through Blackest Night.
• Saga (especially if you liked that Adam Strange issue).

If you enjoyed Simon’s time on the podcast, be sure to check him out on Twitter as @Mogis_Disciple. And be sure to join us here next month, when we discuss Die Vol. 1 with guest host Jonathan Gurney.

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New to the show? Waiting on the Trade is a monthly comics podcast, run by two gents who don’t have time for monthly comics. If you’d like to get in touch with us, you can email us at WaitingOnTheTrade@gmail.com.

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As always, thanks for listening!