Lanterns Keeps The DCU Stuck On The Ground
With a conspiracy thriller modeled after True Detective, DC’s expanding universe feels smaller than ever.
The new DC Universe is a world built, for better and worse, on the backs of C-list heroes. There’s a reason this reboot — spurred by Marvel’s erstwhile edgelord, James Gunn, and producer Peter Safran — officially began with Creature Commandos, of all things. Gunn clearly loves to dredge the bottom of the proverbial toybox to resurrect the heroes time forgot. And admittedly, that’s given the DCU some scrappy, punk-rock vibes where it counts: it’s hard not to be charmed by Gunn’s choice for the Green Lantern, for example, who reluctantly mentors the Man of Steel in Superman.
Of course Gunn would use Nathan Fillion’s Guy Gardner, a foul-mouthed former gym teacher with a gold tooth and a terrible bowl cut, to introduce the Green Lantern Corps to a new generation. It was a deep cut just troll-y enough to set the tone for his offbeat world of Gods and Monsters — but what exactly did it mean for, say, Hal Jordan or John Stewart? Were they unavailable when Lex Luthor was tearing Metropolis apart? How did they fit into Gunn’s vision?
DC’s powers that be are very aware of the plot wrinkle these questions might create. That, among other reasons, is why we have Lanterns. One-part fix-it fiction, one-part convoluted origin story, it largely exists to explain why the two most famous and beloved Lanterns sat out the events of Superman. The DCU can have its cake and eat it too, but when the result is this dense and impersonal, Gunn & co. were probably better off sticking with Guy Gardner.
Lanterns wants to be The Defiant Ones, but it pulls far too many punches.
If Superman kicked the door open to let a host of heroes into the DCU, Lanterns feels retrograde by comparison. It’s a story told mostly through flashback, with a plot that darts across timelines to paint a complex portrait of its unlikely duo. Hal Jordan (Kyle Chandler) might just be this planet’s first true superhero; at the very least, he is the first Earthling appointed to be a Lantern. Though he’s beloved by the public, the scope of his jurisdiction is murky. Sometimes he’s called in to apprehend an international terrorist for the U.S. Marines; sometimes he’s the only thing standing between Earth and an extraterrestrial threat. He’s good at his job, if occasionally overzealous, even a little callous. Maybe that’s what the job requires: to be a Green Lantern, one has to leave fear at the door forever. There’s no telling what that might do to someone after years of service, though Lanterns is keen to find out.
Lanterns’ braintrust — comprised of comics legend Tom King, Ozark creator Chris Mundy, and Watchmen’s Damon Lindelof — tackles a typically cosmic adventure from a surprisingly grounded angle. The trio trades interstellar intrigue for the intimate, prickly character studies we’d sooner see in Lindelof’s The Leftovers or (Lanterns’ biggest creative influence) True Detective. It’s hard to say if anyone was really asking for a grounded western here, and Lanterns doesn’t make a compelling case for such a pivot anyway. It might make sense for Chandler’s home-grown Hal; on the hard-nosed John Stewart (Aaron Pierre), it fits like a ring two sizes too small. He’s introduced as Hal’s long-suffering apprentice, a falsely humble ex-Marine who will stomach any indignities or aggressions (both micro and macro) to complete his Lantern training.
Presumably, John will replace Hal if he ever retires or can’t continue his duties, but Hal also has no intention of giving up his ring. That impasse paves the way for plenty of asinine ego-checking, betrayal, and eventual understanding. In short, Lanterns wants to be The Defiant Ones, but for all its posturing, it isn’t nearly brave enough to take that leap.
Pierre eventually makes a case for his John Stewart casting, but it’s almost too little too late.
It’s hard to say if Pierre himself makes sense for Lanterns. His casting roused the same debates about colorism and privilege that have plagued Black Hollywood for decades. John’s co-creator, Neal Adams, designed the character to be dark-skinned, a concerted response to the trend of light-washing Black characters in comics. That choice shouldn’t be undone for just anyone. Lanterns does eventually (if feebly) acknowledge the privileges that a light-skinned, green-eyed John might have over, say, his darker-skinned older brothers. Even with eight episodes, though, it doesn’t have the space to tackle something so thorny with the nuance it deserves. It has a hard enough time unpacking John’s baffling new origin story, penned by Vanessa Baden Kelly, which fights to reconcile his dueling comic origins as both a Marine and an architect with overwrought commentary on privilege and respectability.
The John of Lanterns has grown up believing that he deserves the ring more than anyone — not because he’s inherently fearless, but because of the prejudices that instill existential fear into men like him and allow men like Hal to cut the line. That he feels cheated of his birthright is just one heavy-handed analogy designed to drive a wedge between himself and Hal, and the series packs on more still to justify their mutual resentment. It’s the kind of swing that needs a lot of time to pay off… more time than Lanterns has to spare. The series also has a conspiracy or two to unspool, each only passingly compelling. Hal and John spend a lot of time in the wasteland that is Rushville, Nebraska, searching for an extraterrestrial terminator (or Manhunter) who’s been embedded in the town for decades. Multiple alien parties are searching for this figure — but the fact that everyone has adopted the generic human disguise of a Gun-Toting, Khaki-Wearing Militia Member makes Lanterns’ few cosmic elements feel numbingly pedestrian.
The show’s True Detective inspirations keep it stuck on the ground.
Lanterns wastes precious time rehashing the beats of a bleak, banal western. The logic of the series never quite clicks, whether it’s working to explain who’s wielding Earth’s one Lantern ring, or grounding alien threats with Earthly politics. It’s hard to say why anyone does what they do, even with someone as talented as Kelly Macdonald (in a thankless role as Rushville’s sheriff) broadcasting a play-by-play in every scene. By the time the series reaches for true weirdness on foreign planets and villains that comic readers might actually recognize (like a grossly underutilized Sinestro) — or, better yet, finally finds an emotional sweet spot for this stilted ensemble — it’s almost too late to make a difference.
It’s the performances that keep Lanterns from crumbling completely. Pierre eventually gets opportunities to prove why he was seemingly the only choice to play John, even if he has to wade through what is essentially a rehash of his arc in Netflix’s Rebel Ridge to reach them. Early episodes of Lanterns downplay the actor’s natural charm in favor of sequences that showcase his long-suffering resolve. The beats are infernally stale, but they make the moments when Pierre is actually able to crack a joke feel downright convalescent.
Lanterns has a fantastic cast, but they’re no match for a dense, stilted story.
Initially, Chandler’s Hal Jordan has the opposite problem. When playing opposite John, he’s forced to go so broad the humor lands with a thud. It’s not until the bravado melts away that Chandler gets to excavate something worthwhile: the feral wounds of a man who’s put off his own mortality for far too long. The same could be said for Lanterns on the whole. The series tries too hard to turn this story into something it’s not, and in the process, it pushes everything that makes it special just out of frame. It’s not that a grounded detective story couldn’t soar, given the circumstances — but without heart, or at least a sense of wonder, Lanterns is stuck on the ground.
