We’ve reached the penultimate episode of Lanterns! It’s 2026, Hal Jordan has been murdered, and John Stewart needs to figure out who in Rushville pulled the trigger. For the second-to-last episode, it somehow feels like both a lot and not a lot happened, making me think Lanterns is saving its craziest revelations for its season (and possibly series) finale. But before we get into all that, what exactly is “The Jordan Boys’ Legacy,” and how does it connect to Hal’s death and the series’ overarching mystery?
SPOILERS BELOW!!!
Like Father, Like Son
The episode begins with a flashback to 1975. What? Are we done with going back and forth to years ending in the number 6?
A young and bruised Hal (Henry Samiri) is in trouble and waiting in his Little League coach’s office for his father, Martin Jordan (Jake B. Miller), to arrive. The coach reveals that Hal refused to give up a baseball, causing his team to forfeit the game and leading to him getting into a fight with several of his teammates. Surprisingly, Martin actually stands up for his son’s decision once he learns that the coach picked another pitcher who isn’t as good as Hal, even though they were about to win. Hal quietly watches from his chair as his father and coach get into a fistfight, a smile tugging at his mouth.
It’s pretty clear right away where Hal gets his stubbornness from, and Henry Samiri does a surprisingly good job replicating Kyle Chandler’s performance. There’s something about the way he speaks that makes him instantly recognizable as Hal instead of some generic kid who happens to be playing a younger version of him.
There’s also some clever mirroring between the coach pitting Hal against his teammates because he wouldn’t give up the ball when they should’ve been working together against the other team, and the Guardians pitting John and Hal against each other because Hal wouldn’t give up the ring when they should’ve been working together against the Manhunter. It’s subtle, but it works.
Afterward, Martin gives Hal the key to his personal safe in case anything ever happened to him, explaining that his own father once did the same for him and calling it the “Jordan boys’ legacy.” It’s the beginning of the episode, and we’ve already got our title drop. This episode is not messing around. Hal has such a nice and wholesome relationship with his father, and the flashback ends with Hal attending his funeral. I’m sure none of that will become even more incredibly depressing later.
The Return of Hal Jordan… Sort Of
Fifty-one years later, Hal Jordan (Kyle Chandler) has just had his own funeral, and now his holographic copy from 2006 is staring down at his unearthed corpse after being released from the ring by John Stewart (Aaron Pierre). He’s called the Halogram, but I’m just gonna call him Hal for short.
Hal hasn’t been activated in 10 years, so John quickly catches him up on the basics, including older Hal’s murder and the fact that John isn’t the current Green Lantern of Earth. There’s a funny moment when Hal asks how great his funeral was, and John lies that thousands of people attended, including the entire Green Lantern Corps. Hal asks if Mogo was there, and John claims that he was standing right next to him.
It looks like John forgot that “Mogo doesn’t socialize,” because Hal informs him that Mogo is a planet. Whoops!
Now that Hal knows John is lying to him, their reunion is off to a rocky start. John needs Hal to open his storage vault using his voice, but Hal refuses to say a single word within earshot of it until John tells him what happened to the real Hal over the past decade.
The answer is a mixed bag. On one hand, Hal lost the ring, went to prison, and died a disgraced man. On the other, he found real love with Sheriff Kerry Kane (Kelly Macdonald). The Halogram is amazed by all of this and agrees to help John open the vault on one condition: he wants to meet Kerry.
John is skeptical because the ring is down to only 5% power and still draining. Without a power battery, when the ring dies, Hal dies (again), and John loses his only way into the vault. Hal thinks there’s enough juice for a trip to Kerry and back, and since John has no other option, he reluctantly agrees.
“ME AND MOGO, WE STOOD RIGHT HERE, MOGO AND I.” – JOHN STEWART, THE MOST HONEST MAN ON EARTH.
John and Hal Are Actually Fun Together Now
Immediately, this episode feels a lot more fun than the previous one thanks to Kyle Chandler’s presence. He and Aaron Pierre are so entertaining to watch together, especially now that Chandler is playing the younger, nicer holographic version of Hal, which gives their dynamic a refreshing change.
It’s funny seeing Hal applaud John for somehow keeping constructs like him active even when he’s not wearing the ring, something the real Hal never did to John for doing it in the second episode. That’s also probably how John manages to keep the Halogram alive for so long despite the ring’s low battery. It’s equally funny that John can now shut Hal up and make him disappear whenever he feels like it simply by thinking about it. As nice as 2006 Hal is, the real Hal Jordan was still a massive jerk who tried to kill John multiple times, so he’s earned this to some extent.
The comedy doesn’t erase how different this Hal is from the man we’ve spent most of the series watching. When the Halogram learns about all the deaths Hal caused in Rushville 10 years ago, he’s horrified and makes it clear to John that he and the real Hal aren’t the same person. The seriousness of the moment is then contrasted with Hal being baffled that someone like Guy Gardner, a gym teacher with a gold tooth and a bowl cut, somehow became Earth’s Green Lantern instead of John Stewart. It’s scenes like this that show that Lanterns is good at balancing comedy and drama when it needs to.
JOHN MUST FEEL SO SAFE TO BE IN A CAR WITH HAL NOW THAT HE’S THE ONE DRIVING FOR ONCE. 0% CHANCE FOR A CAR CRASH ON PURPOSE THIS TIME.
Maggie Still Wants Her Money
At Rushville High School, John is preparing to meet Kerry when Maggie (Hannah Christine Shetler) approaches him and demands $315,000 in reparations in return for not telling the sheriff that she saw John break Hal’s nose the night he died.
As I said in my last review, this subplot still feels unnecessary and uninteresting. Thankfully, the scene is over pretty quickly, with John giving Maggie his expensive-looking watch and assuring her that the money is being transferred. There’s only one episode left after this, so there’s still time for an interesting payoff, but I’m not holding my breath.
Meanwhile, people have gathered in the school gymnasium to watch Kerry’s son Noah (Shea Pritchard) decide which college he’s going to attend, only for him to announce that he’s not ready to decide just yet. It kind of feels like Noah wasted everyone’s time, especially since Kerry mentions that she’s hosting a party afterward for 100 people to celebrate something Noah didn’t even do.
I’m not a sports guy, so I have to wonder: Do people in small towns actually gather in school gymnasiums to watch their all-star quarterback pick a hat for a college and celebrate it? I know everyone in Rushville loves Noah, but still.
Hal Meets Kerry One Last Time
Afterward, John takes Kerry into an empty classroom and introduces her to the Halogram. Kelly Macdonald shows a lot of emotional range as Kerry looks at the face of her dead boyfriend and gets to talk with him one last time. It’s a really sweet and emotional scene, which is slightly undercut afterward when Hal tells John that he thinks Kerry murdered him.
The real Hal claimed that his instincts were never wrong, and apparently the Halogram is no different. He tells John that he recognized guilt in Kerry’s reaction to seeing him. Considering everything Kerry has already lied about throughout the series, it’s not an impossible theory, but we’ll have to wait until the finale to find out if he’s right.
What’s Inside Hal’s Vault?
The Halogram finally opens the vault, and what do they find inside? Untold riches? A dead body? Nope. Just a couple of bags of supplies, including a handgun and a portable wormhole straight out of a Looney Tunes cartoon that leads to another planet.
The idea that Lanterns is finally going to visit another planet, barring the prison planet from Episode 2, is really exciting and makes you think John and Hal are about to go on an intergalactic adventure straight out of Star Wars or Star Trek. Instead, the planet appears to be a dry yellow desert. Yeah, not exactly the most exciting or colorful alien world to land on. But there’s a giant floating abandoned city above their heads, so the planet isn’t completely devoid of wonder.
John feels like he’s been there before despite never setting foot on the planet, and he notices fossilized skeletons buried in the sand. He realizes they’re on Antaan’s (Paul Ben-Victor) homeworld after recognizing it from the memories Antaan’s men injected into his head. Those memories showed John the atrocities the Manhunters were capable of and how they destroyed Antaan’s people.
John explains to Hal that the Manhunters used a gas that corrupted people with fear and drove them to kill each other and themselves, including jumping from the floating city to their deaths. Suddenly, all that yellow surrounding them feels a lot more ominous if you know the source material.
AM I THE ONLY ONE WHO THINKS THE ABANDONED FLOATING CITY LOOKS LIKE THE SYMBOL FOR THE SINESTRO CORPS.?
The Real Jordan Boys’ Legacy
John and Hal spot a rowboat on a lake in the distance and decide to use it to cross, believing the real Hal must have done the same. As John rows through the black fog toward a glowing light in the distance, he starts being haunted by visions and memories. He sees apples bobbing in the water while his father and younger self goad him into shooting them with his gun.
Before John can pull the trigger, Hal throws him into the water and then pulls him back into the boat. Hal tells John that he had actually been pointing the gun at his own head and was about to shoot himself. John realizes the fog contains the same fear-inducing gas that drove Antaan’s species to their deaths, but this also leads to a much darker revelation about Hal’s family. Hal tells John that his father Martin intentionally crashed his jet, killing himself, and that Hal’s grandfather died by suicide as well.
Suddenly, the “Jordan boys’ legacy” means something completely different. At the beginning of the episode, it seemed to refer to the stubbornness passed from father to son. Now it appears that depression and suicide are the much darker legacy running through Hal’s family.
It also potentially explains a lot about Hal himself. Maybe that’s part of why he never started a family of his own and chose to keep everyone at a distance after becoming Green Lantern. John realizes that the Halogram believes the real Hal may have killed himself too, and he expresses genuine sympathy for him. After everything that’s happened between these two men, it’s one of the rare moments when they’re actually on the same page.
IF I HAD A NICKEL FOR EVERYTIME A RED FACED SUPERVILLAIN WOULD MAKE HIS RETURN ON A DEAD PLANET WEARING A HOOD, I’D HAVE TWO NICKELS, WHICH ISN’T MUCH, BUT IT’S STILL WEIRD THAT IT HAPPENED TWICE.
Guess Who’s Back?
John and Hal eventually reach the structure and head inside, where they’re attacked by a hooded figure. John easily subdues and unmasks him, revealing Sinestro (Ulrich Thomsen). And then the episode ends just as things were getting exciting.
The implication seems to be that Hal broke Sinestro out of prison and hid him on Antaan’s homeworld, although why Hal thought Sinestro would be safe there remains to be seen. Considering all the yellow and fear on this planet, maybe it has something to do with Parallax and the creation of the Sinestro Corps.? I guess we’ll find out in the finale.
One Episode Left
“The Jordan Boys’ Legacy” continues Lanterns’ slow burn through its final stretch, with most of the biggest revelations seemingly being hinted at and saved for the finale. Thankfully, the wait is made much more enjoyable by Kyle Chandler’s return as the holographic Hal and his witty banter and complicated chemistry with Aaron Pierre’s John Stewart.
The episode also gives its title a surprisingly dark double meaning. What begins as a story about Hal inheriting his father’s stubbornness and secrets becomes something much sadder as we learn what else has apparently been passed down through the past few generations of Jordan men. After watching Hal spend most of the series desperately holding onto being Green Lantern, this episode gives us another possible reason why he might have needed that identity and purpose so badly. And with the very long-awaited return of Sinestro, Lanterns finally looks like it’s revving up for one hell of a final episode. Let’s all hope it sticks the landing.
HAL MUST’VE STOLEN THAT PORTAL FROM ACME. BEEP BEEP!
