Lanterns has become the breakout hit show of the Fall season and is shaping up to be one of the biggest success stories in the new DC Universe franchise. The show’s approach to Green Lantern lore (as a True Detective-style police procedural) has resonated with a much wider audience than the DC comic book fandom. Still, despite all the pop-culture hype, the exact ratings for the show have been unclear… until now.
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Ratings for Lanterns have been revealed, and the Nielsen data is looking very good for the show, HBO, and the DCU brand. Lanterns has the highest viewership of any DCU TV show, as well as the most streaming views of any TV Show.
Lanterns Is Setting New Ratings Records For DCU TV Shows
According to Nielsen ratings, Lanterns Episodes 1-4 generated 500 million viewing minutes, placing it in the Top 10 of all streaming content across any platform. For comparison, DC Film News notes that The Penguin didn’t even make it to the Top 10 on the Nielsen charts until the finale had aired and the entire show was already streaming on HBO Max. The hype that The Penguin’s final episodes generated got viewers invested and helped boost the show’s popularity (if late in the game) through word of mouth. It was still enough for the limited series to receive three Golden Globe nominations (one win) and a whopping 24 Primetime Emmy Award nominations (with six wins).
Lanterns is only halfway through the season and is already eclipsing The Penguin’s ratings. Combined with the overwhelming hype from viewers and the critical acclaim (93% on Rotten Tomatoes), it’s looking like the show will be an awards contender, for sure. But these kinds of ratings are also key to ensuring that Lanterns gets a Season 2 order, while DC Studios and HBO gain even more confidence in the TV side of the DCU brand. Right now, genre-blends seem to be the formula that works, whether it’s doing a Batman villain show as The Sopranos clone, or doing a Green Lantern show as a True Detective mystery.
Lanterns Is Doing More Than Ratings For the DCU
The real victory that Lanterns can achieve has nothing to do with ratings. The show looks like it has carved out its own lane in the DCU, but the real test will come starting in Episode 6, when other corners of the franchise cross over with the world Lanterns has built.
The Green Lantern we met in Superman, Guy Gardner (Nathan Fillion), will be popping up to see John Stewart (Aaron Pierre) about the murder of Hal Jordan (Kyle Chandler). It’s also been confirmed that Aaron Pierre’s John Stewart will be appearing in the Superman sequel film, Man of Tomorrow. These two crossover moves could establish a bridge between DCU films and TV shows that is stronger than anything we’ve seen from the Marvel Cinematic Universe brand in the last few years.
Lanterns is airing on HBO and streaming on HBO Max.
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IMAGE COURTESY OF PARAMOUNT PICTURES
Forum Conversation: LANTERNS – FINAL EPISODES
Go to ForumThis show is such a mess. This version of Stewart is no Green Lantern either. He’s a frickin VILLAIN! He literally waterboarded a helpless prisoner (torture–doubly so with the ‘water’ tainted to inflict madness); he not only let Hal’s killer get away, scot-free, but her son too, who is the last known Manhunter; he murdered the previous Manhunter/Granny after committing adultery with her multiple times, lying about it too, assaulting THE Green Lantern, Hal, stealing his/Guardian’s ring and lantern; desecrates Hal’s corpse by taking the ring from it; assaults and tortures a helpless prisoner, extorts the prisoner into revealing where the Fear Lantern is at, and then steals that too! Oh, and lets not forget that he lies to the legitimate Green Lantern–Guy–obstructs justice multiple times by hiding the identity/location of Hal’s killer, the identity/location of the Manhunter, and threatens not just Guy but ALL of the other Green Lanterns, and the Guardians! He makes up his own lantern oath, doesn’t even wear a GL outfit, and has no association with either the Guardians or the Lantern corps. He’s a mercenary, a vigilante, a villain–and a damn far cry from any sort of legitimate law enforcement officer, terrestrial or galactic!
Guy Gardner wasn’t afraid of Superman, ready to throw down, but Stewart shuts him up with his what? Blackness? There was no reason Guy shouldn’t have stomped Stewart into the dirt, crushed his finger, took back Hal’s ring for actual decommissioning, destroyed the Fear Lantern and brought Stewart back to OA for sentencing for all of his frickin crimes! This isn’t the incompetent Guy of the cartoons and comics, nor is this the competent Stewart of the cartoons or comics. If this show wasn’t written by woke racists determined to shame and tear down the “greatest” GL to ever exist, then Guy should’ve done the above to this clown pretending he’s a good guy! This show doesn’t deserve a second season, it sure as hell hasn’t earned it! It should be buried and forgotten, along with the rest of this DC nonsense going on! Maybe with the merger done, something can be done to fix this crapfest that is the DC universe but until then, this is best written off and forgotten; a ‘what-if’, oops, that’s Marvel’s thing!
Awful show & even worse viewership
Nielsen
Episodes 1 – 3 MISSED TOP 10
EPISODE 4 SPOT #8
EPISODE 5 SPOT #8
EPISODE 6 SPOT #7
EPISODE 7 & 8 NOT OUT YET
MAKES THE ACOLYTE LOOK GOOD
I really don’t think Hal cloned himself — I think it happened after he was shot — it was right in our face that he healed way too quickly and we just chalked it up to action hero bounce-back. I also don’t think it was Hal that broke out Sinestro — I think it was Lianna. I believe she is a Guardian, but I do not think she is in “good standing”. I think she is doing this all behind the Guardians back and she can do so under the cover of “no one cares about backwater Earth”. Hal hasn’t checked in for over a decade, John’s only contact with the Guardians is Lianna herself, and there is a very legitimate line of thinking that she specifically wanted to experiment with Humans in making them perfect soldiers. A Hal that can be bread to follow orders, and succeed where the Manhunters failed. When that didn’t work out, she broke out Sinestro to overcome the Guardians (or maybe a vain effort to win them over) as they likely align ideologically anyway. Who else told Sinestro about John Stewart, and his potential threat to Hal? Who else COULD have?
It’s right in our faces, plus the Sinestro Corps War hasn’t happened yet… this could be leading to that, and Lianna is one of the fallen Guardians from the comics (Scar, Kronos, or Koyos). They keep telling us about beings that change their shape, and gender — I can see one of those guardians presenting as female so as not to “disturb or upset” Bernadette as she manipulated her into indoctrinating her child to make up for the “shortcomings” of her husband.