HBO's 'Lanterns' premieres August 16 to strong reviews despite back-half pivot concerns

A new DC entry on HBO

"Lanterns," the eight-episode first season from DC Studios, premieres on HBO and HBO Max on August 16, 2026, with new episodes airing weekly through October 4. The series is co-created by Chris Mundy (who serves as showrunner), Damon Lindelof, and Tom King, under the creative oversight of DC Studios heads James Gunn and Peter Safran. Reviews published August 14 are based on seven of the eight episodes, with the finale withheld from critics. The show arrives at a pressure point for the franchise, following the box office flop of "Supergirl" and fan uncertainty about how the Green Lantern property would be handled. The Hollywood Reporter notes the series premieres opposite the new season of "Reacher" on Amazon.

Dual timelines and a rural mystery

The narrative spans two timelines, 2016 and 2026. In 2016, Hal Jordan (Kyle Chandler), Earth's first Green Lantern, is tasked with training John Stewart (Aaron Pierre), a former Marine sniper selected by the Guardians of the Universe as Jordan's replacement. Sources differ on Jordan's tenure: TechRadar places it at 30 years, while Gizmodo and IndieWire say over 20 years. Two months into Stewart's training, a mysterious high school murder draws the pair to Rushville, Nebraska. What begins as a local investigation, with a sheriff played by Kelly Macdonald, unravels into a far-reaching cosmic conspiracy. The 2026 timeline explores the consequences of the duo's actions a decade earlier. TechRadar notes the 2026 storyline "occasionally feels like Lanterns season 1.5," functioning as an overly drawn-out epilogue to the 2016 events. IndieWire describes Hal as a man who "doesn't don his uniform anymore" and shows up "two weeks late and proudly hungover," while John is "the complete package" relegated to "second fiddle to an old white guy who refuses to retire."

Critical reception

Reviews are broadly positive but flag a structural issue in the back half. TechRadar calls "Lanterns" the strongest DC Universe entry yet. Gizmodo describes the first five episodes as compelling, singling out the fifth as "basically a perfectly epic finale," but says episodes six and seven make a pivot that feels like "a completely different show." The Hollywood Reporter compares the series to a Jack Reacher story, calling it "smarter, better-acted and just plain better than any season of Reacher to date." Variety notes the show is "an easily traceable composite of earlier HBO releases," drawing on "Watchmen" and "True Detective" for its tone and structure. Rolling Stone calls it "True Detective with superheroes, for better or worse." Variety also places the show in the context of the broader DC Universe, noting that last year's "Superman" featured Nathan Fillion's Guy Gardner as "de facto comic relief, with an atrocious bowl cut to match."

John Stewart's future in the DC Universe

Showrunner Chris Mundy, speaking to the New York Times, indicated that "Lanterns" is intended as a foundation for John Stewart across DC properties.

We're trying to really put John Stewart on his feet inside our own show, but then, once he's on his feet, he can walk around in the rest of the DC-verse.

Mundy said the creators "had no directives" about connecting the show to the larger DC Universe but acknowledged they were thinking about how it could work. He named John Stewart as a character who could appear in other DC projects, without making similar statements about Hal Jordan.