By Daniel Burns

If you thought Green Lantern was destined to gather dust in the archives after the jarring experience of the 2011 film, you are mistaken. Much like a phoenix rising from the ashes—or, perhaps less dramatically, a delayed train finally chugging into the station—HBO has made the call to place Green Lantern back in the spotlight with its new Lanterns TV series.

Chris Mundy has been handed the keys of showrunner for the series, which will have its narrative crafted by the capable hands of Damon Lindelof and DC comics fathomer Tom King. There’s a conspicuous lack of news on the casting front—let’s hope the powers that be aren’t planning some kind of dramatic, smoke-machine-filled revelation.

The plot thickens—or, at least, starts being drizzled onto the public’s pancake of anticipation—as HBO unfurls a storyline that slots together Lantern newbie John Stewart, established lantern enthusiast Hal Jordan, and a mystery worthy of Agatha Christie, all under the expansive canvas of the American heartland.

Voyage into the Green-Light Dimension

DC Studios co-CEO James Gunn expressed illuminating thoughts on the impending series. He described his exhilaration at bringing DC’s beloved title to HBO with the triumvirate of Mundy, Lindelof, and King steering the ship. In his words, Stewart and Jordan are two of DC’s most dynamic characters, and Lanterns aims to breathe life into them in an original detective yarn.

Nathan Fillion is set to whizz across the screen in Gunn’s Superman film, donning the persona of another Green Lantern, Guy Gardner.

Sins of the Parent

You may recall the Green Lantern’s cinematic soiree with Ryan Reynolds at the helm. The big-budget production bounced off the audience as effectively as a poorly coordinated belly flop, leaving Warner Bros. and DC to pick up the pieces.

They whipped up a Green Lantern TV show in the autumnal shades of 2020—a time when Max was still known as HBO Max. That series featured a different showrunner (Seth Grahame-Smith) with a different set of lanterns (Finn Wittrock’s Guy Gardner and Jeremy Irvine’s Alan Scott) leading the charge.

Donning the Cosmic Beat

With their enlarged cast and option to run a new intergalactic incident every week (goodness knows there are enough aliens causing shenanigans), Lanterns should blend better with the television format. At least, that’s what we’re pinning our hopes on. It would take considerable effort for this series to dive deeper than the notorious Green Lantern film.

So rally your stardust-trimmed capes and prime your alien handcuffs, because we’re about to plunge headlong into another shade-tinted odyssey courtesy of HBO’s Lanterns.