Lanterns (2026)
Lanterns is a 2026 drama series created by Damon Lindelof and Chris Mundy. It stars Kyle Chandler, Aaron Pierre and Kelly Macdonald.
A body turns up in the American heartland, and the two officers who catch the case answer to an intergalactic police force rather than a county sheriff. Hal Jordan has carried the ring for years. John Stewart is the new recruit. Their investigation begins as one local crime and leads somewhere wider.
Lanterns comes from Chris Mundy, Damon Lindelof and Tom King for HBO, with Mundy as showrunner. It draws on the DC Comics Green Lantern characters rather than on a fresh cosmic mythology. DC Studios and Warner Bros. Television produced it, and it arrives as the third television series in the DC Universe. The cast includes Kyle Chandler, Aaron Pierre, Kelly Macdonald, Garret Dillahunt, Poorna Jagannathan and Jason Ritter.
The series has not aired yet, so this page carries premise, creative team and cast rather than a verdict. On paper it reads as a procedural wearing a superhero badge: questions asked in small towns, a veteran and a rookie with a wide gap in experience between them, and the Green Lantern mythology sitting at the edge of a very earthbound case.
Where to watch Lanterns
Stream: HBO (Via Hulu), HBO Max, MAX (Via Amazon Prime)
Official site
Cast
- Kyle Chandler as Hal Jordan / Halogram
- Aaron Pierre as John Stewart
- Kelly Macdonald as Sheriff Kerry Kane
- J. Alphonse Nicholson as John Stewart Sr. (voice)
- Jason Ritter as William 'Billy' Macon
- Michael Ocampo as Deputy Lopez
- Jasmine Cephas Jones as Bernadette Stewart (voice)
- Ulrich Thomsen as Sinestro
- Garret Dillahunt as William 'Will' Macon
- Poorna Jagannathan as Zoe Macon
- Cary Christopher as Young Noah Macon
- Cairo Cash Lee as Adolescent John
Similar series
Explore Lanterns guides
Lanterns in our writing
- The Engine: We Asked the Machine What Lanterns Is
- Cover Story: Where Is All the Green?
A few thoughts on Lanterns
Start with Green Lantern: Beware My Power, the animated feature that puts John Stewart at the center of a Corps mystery, then Green Lantern: First Flight for Hal Jordan's induction and the rookie side of the same dynamic. Green Lantern: Emerald Knights fills in Corps history through short stories.
On the page, Far Sector sits closest to this premise, a Lantern working a homicide case in a city far from Earth, while The Human Target, Volume 1 runs a DC mystery at detective pace. Blackest Night is the place to go for Corps scale instead of Corps procedure.
In film, Watchmen treats a superhero murder as a noir case file, and Men in Black is the comic version of two cosmic cops on an Earth beat, veteran and rookie included.
Green Lantern comics to read before the show
Lanterns draws Hal Jordan and John Stewart from DC Comics rather than building a fresh cosmic mythology, so the source material is sitting right there. N.K. Jemisin's Far Sector runs one homicide investigation across a single alien city, the closest comic to the show's premise. Blackest Night and Brightest Day cover the Corps events that shaped the modern Hal.
DC animated films that already told Green Lantern
Green Lantern has spent most of its screen life in animation. First Flight follows Hal through Corps training, Emerald Knights collects short ring-bearer stories, and Beware My Power builds around John Stewart, the two leads Lanterns pairs up. The animated series ran Hal off Earth for a full season. Lanterns starts on one local case, so these show the Corps at full scale.
Superhero stories that play as police procedurals
Lanterns opens on a body in the American heartland and two officers working the case, except their badge comes from an intergalactic police force. These run the same way: powers and masks pushed through case files, partners who argue, and long interrogations instead of skyline fights. Damon Lindelof created HBO's Watchmen before writing on this one, and it sits closest in register.
The rest of the new DC universe on screen
Lanterns lands as the third television series in the new DC universe, which makes everything else on this shelf its neighbours. Superman & Lois and The Flash carry the older network era, Doom Patrol handles DC's stranger corners, Zack Snyder's Justice League closes out the previous film run, and Young Justice covers the animated side of the same roster. The 2011 game hands you the ring.