HAL WON’T EVEN LET JOHN WEAR THE RING IN THE POSTER!
Over 15 years ago, Ryan Reynolds’ Green Lantern movie was released to critical and commercial failure, tanking its chances of becoming the first installment in a DC Comics shared cinematic universe that could compete with the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Even Reynolds, the movie’s lead star, was disappointed in it and made a point of joking about the film several times in his critically acclaimed Deadpool movies.
But HBO’s Lanterns series is nothing like that ugly CGI slopfest. Instead, it takes more of a True Detective approach to adapting Green Lantern to television. Premiering just a couple months after the critical and commercial disappointment of Supergirl caused some nervousness in the fandom over whether James Gunn’s new DCU could succeed with projects not written or directed by Gunn himself, Lanterns seems to have quieted down the Zack Snyder fanboys for the time being.
But how is the first episode of Lanterns?
SPOILERS BELOW!!!
SEE EVERYONE! THE COSTUME IS GREEN!
A Pilot in More Ways Than One
The first episode is titled “Pilot,” which is actually pretty clever considering its double meaning. “Pilot” is commonly used as the title of a TV show’s first episode, while one of the protagonists, Green Lantern Hal Jordan, is an Air Force pilot.
The episode takes place across three time periods: 1996, showing the childhood of John Stewart; 2016, where the main storyline of the season begins; and 2026, the present day.
In 1996, a young John watches a late-night television interview with Hal Jordan (Kyle Chandler), Earth’s very first Green Lantern (Does this mean Green Lantern Alan Scott doesn’t exist?). Hal has finally revealed himself to the public after ten years (1986! Sensing a pattern?) as a superhero and stopping a meteor from crashing into the planet.
Hal explains that losing his father at a young age helped make him fearless enough to be chosen by the Green Lantern ring. According to him, once a child loses a parent, there’s nothing left to fear.
And then John’s father comes home.
John Stewart Sr. (J. Alphonse Nicholson), a strict and abusive U.S. Marine, discovers his sons awake past their bedtime. As punishment, he takes John outside, places an apple on his head, pulls out his gun, and asks if he’s afraid. John responds, “No, sir.”
His father shoots the apple off his head.
The vertical line of bullet holes in the wall behind John suggests his father has done this before. It can also be interpreted as one really messed-up growth chart.
It’s a disturbing but effective introduction to John, who is clearly less afraid of his father than his brothers are, immediately establishing the fearlessness that will eventually make him worthy of becoming a Green Lantern. Hal’s earlier comment about losing a parent also becomes much more ominous after seeing John’s home life. John’s mother isn’t shown, so it’s still unclear whether she’s alive or still part of his life at this point.
Hal Jordan, World’s Worst Mentor
The episode jumps 20 years to 2016, where an adult John Stewart (Aaron Pierre) is being trained by an older, grizzled, and hungover Hal Jordan.
Calling what Hal does “training” might be generous.
Hal hasn’t taught John much over the last couple months, and John hasn’t even been allowed to hold the Green Lantern ring yet. Hal suspects the Guardians of the Universe want John to replace him, something he has absolutely no interest in letting happen. He even tells John that the only way he’s getting the ring is over his dead body.
Be careful what you wish for.
Hal and John’s dynamic is immediately one of the strongest parts of the episode. Hal is funny but grumpy, arrogant, and emotionally distant, while John is quiet, serious, and obviously fed up with his mentor. Kyle Chandler and Aaron Pierre have great chemistry together, and their clashing personalities make their scenes entertaining even when not much action is happening.
Things escalate when Hal finally gives John the ring and tests his willpower by jumping out of their moving car and letting John drive off a cliff.
Totally reasonable training exercise.
Luckily, John proves fearless enough to use the ring and saves himself with light-generated bubble wrap of all things. It’s not actually shown onscreen, but it’s a funny introduction to John’s use of the ring, while also showing just how reckless Hal can be. One wrong move and John could’ve actually died.
On his way back to Hal, the ring creates a holographic version of Hal from ten years earlier. The “Halogram” is based on Hal’s consciousness. He is surprised to learn from John how terrible his older self is as a mentor and gives John a mysterious message to deliver to him. Since this version of Hal is from 2006, could this mean we’ll eventually get a flashback to that point in his career?
The message leads Hal to Rushville, Nebraska, where he immediately flies off without John. Since John still doesn’t know how to fly, he’s forced to find his own way there.
It’s pretty funny to watch when you realize Hal could’ve just used the ring to carry him.
True Detective Meets Green Lantern
Once the story reaches Rushville, Lanterns really starts showing what kind of superhero series it wants to be.
Hal and John investigate a mysterious shooting at a high school football game alongside Sheriff Kerry Kane (Kelly Macdonald), who isn’t thrilled about superheroes interfering with her case. Hal suspects the victims might be aliens disguised as humans, and the investigation eventually proves him right when a suspect reveals himself as an alien infiltrator and tries to blow himself up.
Hal contains the explosion with his ring, but the mystery only gets bigger. Aliens are hiding in Rushville, but nobody knows why they’re there or what they want.
The episode also introduces several colorful locals, particularly Kane’s family. Her husband, Billy Macon (Jason Ritter), becomes Hal’s last-minute lawyer after a drunken bar fight; their son Noah (Cary Christopher) is an aspiring football player; and Billy’s father, William Macon (Garret Dillahunt), runs what is essentially an anti-extraterrestrial neo-Nazi militia compound.
Then there’s William’s wife, Zoe Macon (Poorna Jagannathan), who John had sex with the previous night.
And William might know about it.
Needless to say, Rushville is probably going to get complicated.
What makes this storyline interesting so far is how strange it feels to see Green Lantern filtered through a grounded police procedural. This isn’t Hal and John flying through space and fighting giant aliens. They’re interviewing suspects, dealing with local law enforcement, and investigating a murder mystery in Nebraska.
For a show about two superheroes wielding some of the most powerful weapons in the universe, Lanterns is surprisingly restrained.
There’s actually not much action in the premiere. We get a car crash, a foot chase through a high school, and an explosion. That’s about it. Hal mostly uses the Green Lantern ring for important tasks like creating counterfeit money and opening a bottle of beer.
That’s definitely not what you’d expect from superheroes whose rings allow them to fly through space and create glowing green objects using their imaginations.
But so far, that restraint works.
THIS MADE ME REALIZE SOMETHING. HOW DOES HAL ACTUALLY GET BY WITHOUT A PAYING JOB?
A Very Different Kind of Green Lantern Show
Lanterns seems much more interested in establishing Hal and John as people before throwing them into all the crazy, action-packed, intergalactic superhero stuff comic fans are expecting.
A big reason that approach works is Kyle Chandler and Aaron Pierre. Hal and John’s personalities could’ve easily made both characters unlikable, but Chandler and Pierre give them enough charm and complexity to keep you invested in their uneasy partnership. Watching these two gradually figure each other out might end up being just as important as solving the mystery in Rushville.
There are also enough references to the source material to remind Green Lantern fans what world they’re in, like Hal explaining how he received his ring from its previous owner, the dying alien Green Lantern Abin Sur. Even so, this is clearly a very different interpretation of Green Lantern.
Tom King and Damon Lindelof are writers and producers on Lanterns, and both are equally respected and controversial depending on your opinions of their work. They’re also known for deconstructing superheroes, with Lindelof creating HBO’s Watchmen series and King writing comics like Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow, Strange Adventures, The Human Target, and Danger Street.
So expect plenty of traumatized characters questioning what it means to be a superhero, possibly committing a war crime or two along the way, and dropping plenty of F-bombs because this is HBO and DC is allowed to be grittier than Disney-owned Marvel.
Hal even admits that he doesn’t normally wear his Green Lantern costume anymore because he thinks it looks ridiculous, only putting it on for special occasions.
One way to approach Lanterns might be to view it almost like an Elseworlds interpretation of Green Lantern rather than expecting a completely faithful adaptation of the comics. So far, the characters still feel recognizable enough for that approach to work.
Also, funny enough, there’s not a whole lot of green in Lanterns so far.
Just a lot of browns.
Maybe things will get greener over the next seven episodes.
One Hell of a Cliffhanger
But the biggest moment comes at the very end.
The episode jumps another ten years to the present day in 2026, where an older, bearded John Stewart returns to Rushville.
And he isn’t wearing a Green Lantern ring.
John reunites with Sheriff Kane, who takes him back to the football field where the mysterious shooting happened in 2016. Waiting there is the murdered body of Hal Jordan.
And he isn’t wearing a Green Lantern ring either.
It’s a shocking way to end the premiere and almost feels like the creators nervously asking comic fans, “So… who’s your favorite Green Lantern again?”
Killing off such an important DC superhero after only one episode is an incredibly bold move and will no doubt be controversial for fans hoping to see Hal Jordan continue appearing throughout the DCU. Of course, considering most of Lanterns takes place in 2016, Kyle Chandler clearly isn’t disappearing from the series after one episode. The Halogram also opens the door to exploring even earlier points in Hal’s life.
Instead, the question is no longer whether Hal Jordan dies.
It’s how he dies, who killed him, what happened to his ring, and what went wrong between 2016 and 2026.
“Pilot” is a strong opening episode because it leaves you wanting those answers. Lanterns isn’t the cosmic Green Lantern adventure some fans might have expected, at least not yet, but its combination of superhero drama, sci-fi mystery, and grounded crime story already gives it a unique identity.
For a superhero murder mystery, that’s one hell of a way to get things started.
PERHAPS GREEN LANTERN GUY GARDNER HAS HAL’S RING? THIS DOES TAKE PLACE AFTER SUPERMAN.
