Emotional Spectrum - Colours

Colours

In DC Comics, the emotional spectrum is divided into the seven colours of the rainbow, with each colour corresponding to a different emotion: rage (red), avarice (orange), fear (yellow), willpower (green), hope (blue), compassion (indigo), and love (violet).

At San Diego Comic Con 2009, Geoff Johns described his own vision of the emotional spectrum; an aspect of the DC Universe he introduced at the end of the 2007-2008 Sinestro Corps War storyline in the Green Lantern titles and then began to shape more actively during the preliminary stages of 2009's Blackest Night plotline. He explained that the idea is something he sees as being real, and a product of the complexity of human emotions (as well as those of other sentient, fictional beings within the comics he writes).

The two emotions on the far ends of the emotional spectrum (rage and love), have a much stronger influence over their users. Johns explains that rage is an emotion that's closely related to the primal instincts one needs in order to survive. In instances of fight-or-flight response, rage would embody "fight." Johns elaborates that love is the most pure emotion, but also "powerful and just as distorting as rage." Though these emotions are overwhelming, they are not negative if used correctly. While describing interaction between the different emotions, Johns describes willpower (the emotion central to the spectrum) as being the ability to maintain control over one's emotions and grow as an individual. Hope embodies a spiritual quality that emerges from that awareness, and compassion (according to Johns) is an even more difficult emotion to explain that is more rare in today's society.

Although originally only the Green Lanterns and Sinestro utilized the spectrum, the formation of Corps around other colours of the spectrum is explored in the "Sinestro Corps War" and Blackest Night storylines.

• Red Lantern Corps: With their origin introduced among plot elements revolving around the Five Inversions, this Corps draws their power from rage. Making their debut appearance during the one-shot Final Crisis: Rage of the Red Lanterns, they are founded by the first Red Lantern: Atrocitus. Described as "monsters" by Johns, most Red Lanterns are depicted as irrational and animalistic, though Atrocitus and his leadership of the corps could be described as anti-heroic.

• Agent Orange: Powered by avarice, the sole bearer of the orange light, which represents the emotional power of greed, is a character named Larfleeze (referred to as "Agent Orange" by the Guardians); a creation that Johns has previously described as being one of his favorites. Prominently featured during a multi-issue story arc also titled "Agent Orange," it is revealed that he has the ability to steal the identities of those he's killed and is able to transform them into orange light constructs which comprise his Orange Lantern Corps.

• Sinestro Corps: Story elements from Green Lantern: Rebirth and The Sinestro Corps War expand upon Sinestro's yellow power ring into a prototype for a larger group. The colour yellow is established to be powered by fear, as a natural counterpart to Green Lanterns' will to overcome fear.

• Green Lantern Corps: An intergalactic police force founded and led by the Guardians of the Universe, their members draw upon willpower to generate constructs made of green energy from their power rings.

• Blue Lantern Corps: The first blue ring is created by Ganthet and Sayd at the conclusion of "The Sinestro Corps War" plotline, where it is noted that the emotion of hope is the colour's source of power. Blue Lanterns are only capable of the basic abilities of flight and aura generation on their own. It is only in the presence of an active Green Lantern that the full extent of their abilities is realized, as hope is nothing without the willpower to enact it.

• Indigo Tribe: Johns was very secretive in revealing plot elements surrounding the Indigo Tribe in Green Lantern, which corresponds to the indigo light of compassion being especially elusive in the DC Universe. Making their first extended appearance in Blackest Night: Tales of the Corps #1, they display the ability to teleport and reproduce the abilities of other Corps.

• Star Sapphires: The Star Sapphires are a Corps based around the Green Lantern villainess of the same name. The next Corps introduced after the Sinestro Corps, the "Mystery of the Star Sapphire" story-arc depicts the Zamarons creating power rings and batteries powered by love (a long running theme with the Star Sapphire character). In Blackest Night: Tales of the Corps #2, former Star Sapphire Carol Ferris is revealed as being invited to join the Star Sapphires in order to lead the new violet Corps.