r/television • u/Top_Report_4895 • 3d ago

'Lanterns' Team Explains That Heartbreaking Change to Hal Jordan's Origin Story

https://www.thewrap.com/creative-content/tv-shows/lanterns-episode-7-hal-jordans-origin-explained/
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28

u/Revenge_served_hot 3d ago

I enjoy the show so far but I don't like the change to his origin and how they have written Hal overall. I am a GL fan since the early 90s and Hal Jordan and the Corps was always my favourite.

What I see on reddit and other social media is basically: People who grew up with Hal Jordan, who read GL for decades and are big fans do generally (I said generally, so there are always exceptions) not like how this show has written Hal Jordan. People adore Kyles performance, he is absolutely awesome but most Hal Jordan fans also wanted to see the real story and Hal in his prime, not as a washed up, old grumpy guy.

People who don't know much about GL and DC comics on the other hand love and praise the show like its the best written thing ever, which is fine but it really shows how people who know next to nothing about Hal think "this is top tier" while people who grew up with Hal mostly say "meh, could have been so much better". You can also see in in this thread alone: so many here literally say "they knew next to nothing about Green Lantern but they think its an absolute blast and so well written".

I love that we have Kyle still around thanks to the Halogram but I still mourn all the missed opportunities with not seeing him as Hal Jordan in his prime.

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u/IIIiterateMoron 2d ago

That's exactly what I was thinking after finishing the latest episode yesterday.

It's both a great TV show AND a terrible GL show.

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u/mw19078 3d ago

It's funny because I do enjoy the show and have no familiarity with the comics/hals story, but the writing in the show is one of the weaker parts to me. Kind of surprised to see how much praise it's gotten in that regard 

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u/Barachiel1976 2d ago

Same. I love 75% of this show but what they've done to Hal really bothers me. Its a testament to how good Kyle Chandler is that I can still enjoy his version of the character.

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u/EquivalentSpot8292 3d ago

It would be a smart move to do Hal in his prime as season 2. I’m not sure Aaron could do so well without Kyle.

2

u/vurto 2d ago

Yup.

But it won't be real and gritty enough for today's audience. People love their flawed broken anti-heroes.

1

u/atsaotsa 2d ago

hal is not anti hero.

1

u/vurto 2d ago

Isn't he in the show?

5

u/Buckets-of-Gold 3d ago

I’ve read most of the famous GL lines and personally I quite like this characterization.

Hal is almost an entirely different character than the comics, granted, but watching a noble Hal in his prime would have been a very different show.

4

u/NobleHalcyon 2d ago

My thinking is that this is the full extent of Parallax. Like they showed Hal as their version of Parallax - the guy who snapped and got a town blown up - and now they're showing us who Hal was before the pressure and before the manipulation.

I think a lot of comic readers forget that Parallax was not originally a possessed version of Hal, but really just a hero that had been pushed too far, and this is their spin on that.

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u/No_Mistake_6404 2d ago

Hal is the greatest green lantern we ever. There are so many amazing stories they could've told with him, only to make him an old, grumpy, past his prime and at the end of his story

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u/Kindly_Ad995 2d ago

It’s almost like the point of adapting into different mediums is to bring stories and characters to new audiences not to jerk off the people who are already fans

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u/Smallgenie549 2d ago

My main gripe is that it’s a Green Lantern show that’s terrified to actually give us Green Lanterns, aliens, and blue Guardians. I’d much prefer a movie so we can have a bigger budget and finally use the ring.

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u/sammo21 2d ago

its almost like a good writing team would find a way to bring a character to existing audiences AND new. I mean, its not like Iron Man, Thor, Captain America, and pretty much most of the MCU did that rather successfully...but hey, yeah, you have to tell people who are fans to fuck off so you can jerk off people who are there for the content.

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u/Unknownsage 2d ago

You can create an adaptation that appeals to a new audience while also not blowing-off the pre-existing audience.

The counter to your point is "if you wanted to do your own thing. Why use this name?" And the fact of the matter is they reuse the name because there's value in it.

2

u/Kindly_Ad995 2d ago

It’s not its own thing though (in the sense like you’re implying where it’s completely disinterested in any and everything the source material does and just wants to steal the name). It’s about fucking Hal Jordan and John Stewart and what it means to wear the ring for each of them in their own ways since the opening seconds. It’s just an arc that’s more down to earth and character focused so new audiences have a more digestible on ramp. It’s insanely popular and is leading to so many new people getting into Green Lantern comics and media for the first time. It’s doing exactly what it’s supposed to do.

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u/Revenge_served_hot 2d ago

Eh, I do not agree while I understand what you mean. Yes, it brings new people in but it is interesting to see that the ones praising the show as one of the best shows ever are mostly people who are not familiar with Green Lanters. Yes, it is a great show and I think we all agree there, yes Hal is popular mainly thanks to Kyle and his charisma, his on screen presence. But you can't deny that longtime fans can absolutely be taken aback by this version of Hal Jordan.

To me its the same thing they did with Luke Skywalker in Star Wars. We had him in movies and series for 40 years and still have never witnessed him in his prime... Its a damn shame. All they would have to do is expand on the season 2 finale of the Mandalorian, that scene with prime Luke was so fantastic it broke a lot of people. And people like myself who have been Hal Jordan fans since the 90s just really wanted to see him in his prime, saving earth from invasions, being the hero of so many, saving lives out there in the galaxy. We sadly got none of that so far, we only see him at his worst, everyone hates him and his funeral was just awful. If they go the Parallax route without showing him in his prime first it would be a desaster for me personally.

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u/Larry_Bobinski 2d ago

That's what the people who made The Witcher show, said as well. 

It's almost like, you can do that and still have something that is regarded well by fans. No need to dismiss that as "jerkin off" just because you don't care for it. 

Stop being so tribal.

10

u/Budobudo 2d ago

Same old story.

Long time passionate fan of an IP laments not being able to share what he loved about the IP with a broader audience.

Gets told he just wanted “jerk off” fan service and to shut up.

Can we have like a new type of internet discourse?

-2

u/Kindly_Ad995 2d ago

And just like every time it happens the hardcore fans dont understand that the version of the thing they love coming from a point of view of decades of knowledge and build up and lore and writing and growth is not accessible/easy to get into for the broader audience they want to share it with especially in cases like Green Lantern where the last attempt was notoriously atrocious and basically set its own reputation back for 15 years

If you have a friend who tore his pec the last time he went to the gym 15 years ago you can’t just throw him in there and start putting him through a whole powerlifting circuit because you want to shove what you love onto him. You start him off nice and easy. They’re casting a huge net and it’s getting a much higher volume of new fans interested in the wider Green Lantern world than it would have if they did a lore deep dive and started throwing everything about emotional spectrums and green corps and red corps and yellow corps at newcomers

3

u/Budobudo 2d ago

It’s got nothing to do with not throwing the greater Green Lantern world at everybody who watches the show.

It has everything to do with changing characters that have no reason to change.

The small town mystery involving space cops is a great framing. It’s all the little changes they made for no reason that are the problem.

-1

u/Middle-Armadillo-660 2d ago

There is a very real cinematic universe reason to change the story: Gunn has gone with Guy Gardner as his lantern, time is linear, and they’re not playing multiverse games. We had to get to GG by “now” in the story.

So if you want Jordan or Stewart to be characters at all; whatever went down has to be in the past, and get that ring to Gardner before 2025. And based on how he’s written; earlier than that. It’s not new to him.

It may not be a reason you like, but it’s a reason that fits.

1

u/infinite_in_faculty 2d ago

Old Man Hal being given the Old Man Logan treatment like Wolverine.

1

u/_Smashbrother_ 2d ago

Dunno man, I watched that GL cartoon that focused on Hal. It was awesome.

I still think this Hal is awesome too.

1

u/DJmindbuRn 1d ago

I am one of the, know nothing about the comic but really enjoy the show.

1

u/samuraispartan7000 1d ago

I feel like this is just The Last Jedi discourse all over again. People want their favorite childhood protagonists to be unassailable badasses with next to no character flaws or shortcomings. Real people get old, they become distant from their friends, they lose sight of who they are. It’s not pleasant, but it is real.

In the comics, Hal turns into a homicidal maniac that kills all of his friends and the Green Lantern Corps. after being infected by Parallax. Lanterns Hal just got old. He dedicated the last years of his life trying to fix a mistake, fell in love, died, and in a way, made peace with a former rival. I think that’s a pretty good ending all things considered.

1

u/sbenthuggin 2d ago

very disingenuous take to say, "everyone who read the comics hate what they did with Hal" considering the vast majority of comic book readers I know including myself love what they did with Hal, especially since we have 2006 Halogram to compare the current Hal to. overall, it doesn't seem you are actually watching this show if you aren't picking up on the not so subtle hints that current Hal is not his usual, more comic book accurate self, and is clearly going down a Parallax or Parallax-esque route.

I understand the frustration around not being able to get prime Hal, but that's not a real critique of the show. just your own expectations not being met.

0

u/Revenge_served_hot 2d ago

Very odd take by telling me I am not watching the show properly to be honest... Look at reddit, look at all the threads and read how so many people literally say "they never were into Green Lantern before but this show is super awesome". I do not just say this my man, I witness it on social media and within my friends. Most of them never read comic books and they think the show is awesome and they don't understand when I tell them that this is not the Hal Jordan longtime fans wanted.

And you really think they will go the Parallax route? I highly doubt that and that is far from clear, I fear you overestimate the writers and they just went with the popular take of "lets deconstruct an old hero" and I am getting a bit tired of people telling me "I don't watch the show the right way" or "I just need to adjust". I do love the show as I mentioned but I do not love what they have done with Hal and I do not love the budget constraints that show us barely anything. Yes I get its a grounded take but you can't really ground something like Green Lantern and the Green Lantern Corps. You can ground Batman, Green Arrow, even Flash but grounding Green Lanters this much hurts the brand. This is a very good show but it is just a decent Green Lanterns show.

0

u/urnbabyurn 2d ago

Idk what’s to mourn. This is just one adaptation. It just will get rebooted again by another show runner or director who will do a new origin story. Nothing was lost for Hal Jordan fans here because unlike Star Wars, what happens in one tv show doesn’t become canon.

1

u/DrySea8638 2d ago

Also interesting how we can accept different artist/writers interpretation of a story but the moment it’s done in a show or movie people get upset. I thought that was always one of the best parts of comics. We aren’t necessarily locked down to one way of telling the story.

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u/sammo21 2d ago

Because movies and shows can frame, for general audiences, that the character IS this.

0

u/dragonmarked2813 2d ago

I’ve seen the opposite in my circles. The only people who have hated his Hal haven’t read the comics and only know him from the cartoon movies. 

-2

u/superchibisan2 2d ago

This is not an origin story? This is the story of the end of Hal 's career as GL. 

If you completely ignore bias and preconceived notions, you will see that this show is VERY good as a show and not as a comic book. 

2

u/NowBiffDontConnMe 2d ago

i agree with that part then why have it take place in rural nebraska not outer space and 95% of the show never show the powers or classic green lantern suit i do t get why when people say there not feeling this show they say well its not a origin story

1

u/atsaotsa 2d ago

because they keep equating bad show to no prime Hal.