Lanterns, “DC’s Greatest Series Yet?”

Lanterns was always bound to be a story I’d enjoy, but if I had even the slightest clue that I’d feel as passionate towards it as I do now, I would have anticipated its’ release a thousand times more fiercely. I doubted it could top Superman and I thought it would be overshadowed by Clayface. Like many others, I lacked respect for the Green Lantern brand after the shitshow that was Green Lantern (2011). Yet here we are now, a day after the finale, convinced that I’ll reminisce about this first season as much as I do towards my very favourite stories across all mediums. Suffice to say, I was blown away by this series in a way I could never have anticipated before watching the pilot, though as each week went by, it grew clearer and clearer that I was witnessing a masterpiece in the making.

If like me you weren’t totally convinced by the trailers, most of your concerns were probably settled moments after you’re introduced to our leads, Aaron Pierre as John Stewart and Kyle Chandler as Hal Jordan. Usually it feels wrong to name the actors before the characters, yet with these two personalities, it just feels right. Even in the official podcast, I noticed a tendency for the writers and supporting staff to more often than not refer to the characters by their actor’s names. It could just be down to their personal bond with the actors, but to me it felt symbolic of how they were able to pull off such tricky characters so perfectly, because these two characters are equally as remarkable as the characters they depict. Throughout every moment of every scene and interview, you can sense how well these actors understand the gravity of their roles but with the confidence and skill to match. It takes powerful people to play such powerful roles, and that’s even evident beyond our leads. Kelly Macdonald revitalised the tired trope of the small-town sheriff, one which I had long tired of, and she regularly achieved the impossible of matching our two stars and sometimes even out-performing them. Within the first episode alone, I was totally sold on all three of these characters and the actors behind them. There aren’t many studios out there as skilled at casting as DC under James Gunn’s leadership.

I can’t believe I’m saying this, but since I live in Scotland, Mondays have been my favourite day of the week these past few months, solely thanks to Lanterns. I remember each episode over the first few weeks, I thought to myself, “There’s no way they can outdo this, right?”, frankly, I would’ve been impressed even if they simply maintained the quality of the first episode, yet even now, despite rewatching every episode – some multiple times – I still can’t choose a favourite episode. As somebody who is obsessed with rating and ranking stories and episodes, that’s shocking to me. I genuinely can’t think of many stories where I’ve struggled this much to pick favourites because of how brilliant everything is.

Unfortunately, as much as I hate to end such a positive review with bleak final remarks, there is one little inconsequential thing I DESPISE about this series, the “fandom”. I wanna really emphasise the quotation marks here, because frankly the fans I’m talking about here are hardly fans at all. They claim to be diehard fans of the Green Lantern comics or DC’s history, yet devote their social media presence to shitting all over new stories. Online discourse has been plagued by these mutants, unfortunately, it’s unavoidable. Every single episode was review bombed, with most ratings on IMDB divided between either “1”, “9”, or “10” (out of 10). Lately, I find myself agreeing more and more with the critics after years of finding them frustrating. What are the grievances of these fans? Let’s boil them down:

• Some hate the grounded nature of the show, believing that a Green Lantern show must strictly adhere to its’ cosmic legacy and be filled from head to toe with constructs and flashy CGI. No, visiting an extinct alien planet irradiated with fear is not enough. No, the inclusion of Sinestro and the Guardians is not enough. No, interdimensional portals and a lead character being a construct from the ring is not enough. No, two manhunters, one guardian, and several alien avengers are not enough, as you see, they all have human forms. No, there being allusions to a rich cosmic history with Hal Jordan is not enough.

These are the kinds of nit-picks I could totally sympathise with if the story wasn’t as well written as it is, or without the context of it being the first season and John’s backstory. It all just screams impatience and a narrow creative vision of what a Green Lantern storyline can be. If future seasons aren’t able to scratch that itch, I’ll start to consider the criticism valid. The way I see it, the story should become more and more cosmic in nature as each season progresses, kind of like how Better Call Saul starts slow with Jimmy McGill (much to the satisfaction of fully-invested fans) before introducing the explosive moments all fans, even the most casual, crave from Saul Goodman. If you skip through the scaling of a multi-season story, those top-scale moments won’t hit half as hard or carry half as much weight.

• Some insist the writers loathe Hal Jordan and that this storyline was intended to be a humiliation ritual for the long-beloved flagship of the Green Lantern brand. It doesn’t matter that this take on Hal has a casting choice so great that there may never be a better performance of the character. It doesn’t matter that Hal is admired across the world (and probably the cosmos), or that he indeed succeeded in stopping Sinestro. They aren’t built for a story where Hal is depicted as morally grey and disillusioned.

Ironically, I think that the overreactions regarding Hal Jordan are proof of just how effective this depiction has been at emotionally investing even disenfranchised fans into his character. The concept of the Jordan Boy Legacy is one which will stick with me for years, yet even that phenomenal alteration of his father’s backstory proved controversial with some fans who for whatever reason prefer the accidental death origin rather than his suicide.