Spoilers for HBO’s Lanterns follow.
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The penultimate episode of Lanterns Season 1 began unraveling the series’ web of cosmic mysteries, and seemingly revealed an unsurprising character as the season’s main string-pulling villain. When John Stewart (Aaron Pierre) and the AI copy of Hal Jordan’s (Kyle Chandler) consciousness stored in his Green Lantern ring use Hal’s portable wormhole to travel to an unnamed alien planet, John recognizes it as the home of the now extinct race of aliens Antaan’s (Paul Ben-Victor) band of soldiers belonged to. John explains how Antaan telepathically showed him how the Manhunters used a fear-inducing gas to make his civilization tear itself apart. After experiencing the fear gas’ effects first-hand John and “Halogram” arrive at a mysterious facility where they are confronted by Thaal Sinestro (Ulrich Thomsen,) the disgraced former member of the Green Lantern Corps who was Hal’s mentor and recently escaped from the Corps’ intergalactic prison.
Sinestro’s more direct involvement in the plot and the theme of fear, which continues to be referenced in the trailer for the season finale, suggest that he will soon take up his other power ring from the DC Comics’ source material, which uses the yellow light of fear, rather than the green of willpower as the Green Lanterns’ do. But while he’s the most famous, Sinestro is far from the only Yellow Lantern. The fourth volume of the ongoing Green Lantern comic book featured Sinestro building his own lanterns corps named after himself, which believed that fear, not willpower was the key to maintaining “order” throughout the galaxy. This culminated in the 2007 crossover storyline “The Sinestro Corps War” in which he led his corps in open conflict against the Green Lanterns. The arc is one of the most popular in Green Lantern comic history, and one episode certainly wouldn’t be enough to do it justice. Given this and comments from creators involved with Lanterns and the wider DC Universe franchise, it’s seeming possible that the latter could be setting up a more elaborate live-action adaption of the story.
Lanterns May Be Building to “The Sinestro Corps War”
Sinestro’s used a yellow ring for most of his comic history, so even the possible introduction of the yellow light itself doesn’t necessarily indicate that Lanterns is going to cover either the larger Sinestro Corps or the war arc. But many of the show’s other storytelling choices do support the speculation that one or both will be adapted, though likely with significant alterations. The comics have always stressed that Green Lanterns need to be able to overcome fear, but different storylines and eras interpret this idea in different ways. Older comics tended to present the characters as completely fearless. But writer Geoff Johns’ franchise-altering run, which started with the miniseries Green Lantern: Rebirth and included The Sinestro Corps War, recognized this as unrealistic and changed it. After revealing that Hal’s 1990s transformation into the supervillain Parallax was partially the result of his possession by the sentient embodiment of fear of the same name, Johns’ stories emphasized that Green Lanterns must be able to recognize and accept their own fears and work past them, rather than believing they simply don’t have any, to avoid being manipulated by the yellow light in the same way. The HBO series has been similarly critical of its version of the Guardians of the Universe for using the earlier criteria that a Lantern must be completely devoid of fear, emphasizing the emotional toll this way of thinking has had on both Hal and John.
This emphasis on the flaws with the Corps’ current perspective and the complicated dynamic between Hal and Sinestro, in which the latter continues to give the former manipulative advice despite the pair now ostensibly being enemies, have both led many fans to expect the show to continue exploring ideas from the Johns run. The specific imagery of Hal’s dead body in his open casket recalls scenes from Rebirth and the character’s apparent attempts to make amends for his past failures and sins in the show’s 2026 storyline echo his portrayal throughout most of the Johns run. However, not all fans are convinced Chandler’s Hal will be as successful in his quest for redemption. Some expect that if the flesh and blood Hal is resurrected after his apparent murder it will be in his Parallax persona, with him and Sinestro forging a villainous alliance. This would further connect the series to The Sinestro Corps War, as younger Green Lantern Kyle Rayner was made into a new host for Parallax for part of that arc. The Sinestro Corps War comics revealed that the green light of willpower was also embodied by a sentient being, Ion, retroactively expanding on a later alter ego of Kyle’s, just as Rebirth had done with Hal and Parallax. While there’s been no indication that Lanterns will be introducing Kyle, John’s unique ability to maintain constructs created with the green light while not wearing a power ring has caused fans to speculate that he may be connected to a version of Ion.
The DC Universe’s Future Is Unclear
Though The Sinestro Corps War was depicted mostly within the pages of Green Lantern “solo” comics, it effected the entire DC Comics universe, with dozens of other superheroes fighting alongside the Green Lanterns and villains from various corners of the franchise joining the Sinestro Corps. So, it’s not hard to imagine the DCU adapting the story as its own live-action crossover with expanded roles for characters like Clark Kent/Superman (David Corenswet,) especially given some of the themes the new franchise has already been exploring and hints viewers have been given about its future. The theme of humanity’s fear of and/or prejudice against aliens and superhumans has been prominent in most DCU projects so far, with Gunn and company having fittingly titled the franchise’s first era or “chapter” Gods and Monsters.
Since the DCU’s first slate of projects in addition to Superman was announced back in 2023, Gunn and fellow DC Studios co-chairman Peter Safran have emphasized that Lanterns’ mystery plot will play an important role in setting up the franchise’s central multi-project storyline. With it now seeming all but certain that Lanterns’ main threat somehow involved Sinestro and the yellow light, a Sinestro Corps War adaptation would be a logical culmination of the arc. That said, it’s not currently clear how closely the DCU creators are sticking to their original plans.
Lanterns is one of only a few projects from that 2023 slate that’s been successfully produced and released, with several others having been repeatedly delayed or even abandoned for the time being. Next year’s Superman sequel Man of Tomorrow is already itself a crossover event, with Corenswet’s Clark set to team with both his archenemy Lex Luthor (Nicholas Hoult) and an assortment of other superheroes including headliners like John Stewart and Kara Zor-El/Supergirl (Milly Alcock) against the AI alien Brainiac (Lars Eidinger), with the film also rumored to introduced even more big-name comic characters. Following that up with another space-based event story like The Sinestro Corps War could easily come across as repetitive. Lanterns has itself turned out to be a hit, but it’s possible the trajectory of Gods and Monsters may have been changed in response to both Superman’s success and the more mixed reactions received by Peacemaker Season 2 and Supergirl, with the Lantern mythology perhaps no longer set to play as central a role as it may have been planned to.
Do you think Sinestro will be the DC Universe’s first Big Bad? Discuss in the comments.
