If you grew up before the Crisis on Infinite Earths, the Hal Jordan Green Lantern you knew was a one note conservative hero whose only flaw might have been that he was too noble, too good, too heroic.
That changed in the 80s with the publication of a miniseries called Emerald Dawn, which saw changes made to Hal Jordan. In the original Green Lantern origin Hal Jordan was chosen because he was the most deserving man in the area; post-Emerald Dawn Hal Jordan was chosen because he was closest. Among the most controversial changes to Hal Jordan was the fact that the miniseries turned him into a drunk driver who served time in the brig for getting behind the wheel while sloshed.
Expect to see that Hal Jordan in the Green Lantern movie. Today director Martin Campbell told me that what people will like best about Hal Jordan is that he is ‘[t]he hotshot military guy who is slightly fucked up. He screws up a bit. He may be a hotshot as a pilot, but he also has chinks in his armor, which is what makes him interesting. In fact if anybody should not be chosen as Green Lantern, it would have been Hal Jordan. That’s the journey that film takes, about somebody who on the surface of it is the least likely candidate to become one of the greatest Green Lanterns.’
In fact, Campbell specifically called Emerald Dawn ‘the origin,’ so any hope of that stoic, right winger Hal Jordan is probably dashed right now.