HBO is at long last signing up with the Lantern Corps.
The premium cable outlet has given a straight-to-series order for Lanterns, based on the long-running Green Lantern characters — specifically John Stewart and Hal Jordan — from DC Comics. Chris Mundy (Ozark) will serve as showrunner on the eight-episode drama and co-write the series with Damon Lindelof (Watchmen, Lost) and Eisner Award winner Tom King, known for his work on several Batman titles, Mister Miracle and Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow for DC Comics.
The (ahem) green light for Lanterns comes almost five years after what was then HBO Max began developing a Green Lantern series with producer Greg Berlanti — the mastermind of the DC Arrow-verse on The CW and one of the writers of the 2011 Green Lantern feature film that starred Ryan Reynolds. The first swing at the series was set to focus on Green Lanterns Guy Gardner and Alan Scott. Seth Grahame-Smith came aboard as writer and showrunner, and the show cast Finn Wittrock and Jeremy Irvine as Gardner and Scott.
A creative overhaul of the show in 2022, however, saw Grahame-Smith depart (despite having written a full season’s worth of scripts) and the show refocus around John Stewart, another member of the Lantern Corps and the first Black superhero to appear in DC Comics. The reworking of the show coincided with — but wasn’t caused by — Warner Bros. Discovery’s installation of James Gunn and Peter Safran as the heads of DC Studios, charged with launching and managing a new DC Universe in film and television.
In early 2023, DC Studios scrapped the Berlanti-led Green Lantern show altogether in favor of Lanterns. “Greg’s vision was more of a space opera that he wanted to do,” Safran said at a press event unveiling the new DC slate. “Our vision is more True Detective, more of a terrestrial-based investigation story. We all agreed to part ways.”
Perhaps not coincidentally, Mundy is coming off of HBO’s True Detective: Night Country, where he was an executive producer and wrote two episodes. He also earned five Emmy nominations for writing and producing Netflix’s hugely successful drama Ozark.
“We’re thrilled to bring this seminal DC title to HBO with Chris, Damon and Tom at the helm,” Gunn and Safran said in a statement. “John Stewart and Hal Jordan are two of DC’s most compelling characters, and Lanterns brings them to life in an original detective story that is a foundational part of the unified DCU we’re launching next summer with Superman.”
Added Casey Bloys, chairman and CEO of HBO and Max Content, “We are elated to be reuniting with both Chris Mundy and Damon Lindelof as they partner with Tom for this fresh take on DC’s Green Lantern. As part of James and Peter’s vision for the DC Universe, this first new live-action series will mark an exciting new era.”
Warner Bros. Television and DC Studios will produce Lanterns. Mundy, Lindelof and King are executive producing and writing the series.
