‘Lanterns’ review roundup, critics, Kyle Chandler, Aaron Pierre

In brightest day, in darkest night, Lanterns isn’t escaping TV critics’ sight. The latest DC Comics-derived live action TV series is launching on HBO and HBO Max on Aug. 16, and so far the word of mouth is much better than the Emerald Knight’s disastrous big screen debut 15 years ago.

How much better, you ask? The Green Lantern movie was slapped with a 25% rotten Rotten Tomatoes score and a basement-dwelling 39 rating on Metacritic. Lanterns, on the other hand, is sitting pretty at 89% on RT and 72 on Metacritic. In other words, there’s no reason for Deadpool to extend his killing spree beyond Ryan Reynolds anytime soon.

On the other hand, Lanterns is on the (slightly) lower end when compared to four other prestige HBO live-action series that were ripped out of the pages of DC Comics. (We’re leaving aside the series that originated on other platforms before migrating to HBO and HBO Max to finish their runs, a list that includes the likes of Doom Patrol, Pennyworth, and Titans.)

Damon Lindelof‘s Watchmen sequel series from 2019 remains the gold standard, and the super-producer is, not coincidentally, one of the creative forces behind this latest series, which features some of his tried-and-true storytelling techniques, including a time-shifting narrative structure. The Penguin starring Colin Farrell is second by a nose, and the John Cena-led Peacemaker scores a surprise third-place finish. That leaves Lanterns at No. 4 — although going purely by the numbers, we have to say that all of these shows are clearly winners.

Critical reaction to live action DC Comics-based HBO series (by year of release)

Besides Lindelof, the creative forces behind Lanterns include Chris Mundy and DC Comics scribe, Tom King, and that heroic trio have concocted a True Detective-esque series that embraces Green Lantern’s status as an Earth-bound space cop. The eight-episode narrative finds Power Ring-carrying Lantern Hal Jordan (Kyle Chandler) showing his replacement, John Stewart (Aaron Pierre), the ropes as various terrestrial and extraterrestrial threats present themselves. Kelly Macdonald is the all-too-human law enforcer that joins in their investigation.

Here’s a sampling of the critical reaction to Lanterns.

In brightest day

Writing in The Daily Beast, sometime superhero skeptic Nick Schager awards Lanterns the status of “must-see TV,” with an appreciative nod in the direction of True Detective. (We’re presuming Season 1, not Season 2.) “Lanterns boasts its fair share of ring-enabled action but, on the whole, tempers pageantry in favor of character drama,” he enthuses. “Surprises are a constant, and though the season’s narrative configuration is a tad jagged, it never falls apart, given that regardless of what they’re up to, Hal and John remain an appealingly antagonistic pair.”

“The most refreshing aspect of Lanterns is that despite its references to larger DCU events, figures, and locales (shout-out, Gotham City!), it’s a self-contained endeavor that doesn’t exert undue energy on mythology integration,” Schager continues. “Of course, since HBO didn’t provide critics with the finale, there’s a chance that the show is biding its time before revealing its true nature as simply a cog in the franchise machine, designed to bridge the gap between its movie chapters.”

Over in IndieWire, Ben Travers appreciates that Lanterns brings the space cops “down to Earth” for a grounded tale of crime and punishment. “Co-creators Chris Mundy … as well as Tom King and Damon Lindelof … don’t let you lose track of what matters, relying on clean structuring, emotional logic, and charismatic performers to carry viewers into the core of a scintillating story,” he writes. “While not as bursting with ideas as Lindelof’s best work or as visually stunning as “True Detective’s” most memorable scenes, “Lanterns” is an exciting synthesis of its creators’ strengths.”

And Decider’s Meghan O’Keefe is a big fan of the two Lanterns themselves, labeling Chandler and Pierre a “dynamite duo,” no doubt reserving the “dynamic duo” designation for a certain pair of Gotham City crimefighters.

“The easiest way to sum up HBO’s Lanterns is that it’s basically pairing two of the most popular Green Lantern characters — Hal Jordan and John Stewart — together in a story that’s loosely, yet obviously, inspired by True Detective Season 1,” she notes. “An older, more jaded, beat detective and his younger partner find themselves pulling on the threads of a weird murder mystery, only to find it leads to unspeakable horrors and major ethical quandaries. Magically, this potentially hokey set up works for Lanterns, thanks in part to the fantastic chemistry of series stars Kyle Chandler and Aaron Pierre.”

In darkest night

On the other hand, Variety‘s Alison Herman finds Lanterns to be a bit too much like the shows that inspired it instead of its own thing. “Pierre and Chandler do their best to banish the ghosts of Marty and Rust from the first season of True Detective, and even if they don’t entirely succeed, they do give Hal and John a prickly and specific chemistry,” she writes. “[But] watching “Lanterns,” you never escape the sense that the show is a piece of high-profile IP taking on the guise of a prestige drama.”

Mike Hale expresses similar reservations in his middling The New York Times review. “What the show does not lean into, until late in the season, are the simple, fantastical pleasures that the Green Lantern mythos offers,” he observes. “For much of the season, the show is not just earthbound but confinded to a small stretch of the Midwest, artfully presented but not as diverting as the alien planets that are within the Lanterns’ reach.

“It continues HBO’s practice of putting a coat of prestige pain on genre properties,” Hale continues. “The gap between the idealistic, fanciful source and the somber, psychological-heavy adaptation is particularly acute with Lanterns. There are long stretches that don’t connect to superheroes or comic books in any essential way. …The show seems to have adopted a defensive crouch with regard to its origins. The drumbeat focus on the wages of power is a drag, and it doesn’t ring true. Where’s the exhilaration?”

And The San Francisco Chronicle‘s Zaki Hasan gives the series an outright pan, arguing: “The show assumes familiarity with Green Lantern lore while approaching its more colorful elements with a curious self-consciousness, practically mouthing, ‘We know this is stupid,’ after every mention.” But he does find some bright spots in the two stars. “The interplay between Jordan’s weary cynicism and Stewart’s simmering impatience points toward a more engaging version of the series lurking beneath all the portentousness,” Hasan concludes.