What Happened To Hal Jordan & 4 Other Mysteries Lanterns Has To Answer

Published Aug 19, 2026, 2:01 PM EDT

Ben Sherlock is a Tomatometer-approved film and TV critic who runs the massively underrated YouTube channel I Got Touched at the Cinema. Before working at Screen Rant, Ben wrote for Game Rant, Taste of Cinema, Comic Book Resources, and BabbleTop. He's also an indie filmmaker, a standup comedian, and an alumnus of the School of Rock.

Warning! Spoilers ahead for Lanterns’ series premiere.

Lanterns has gotten off to a very strong start on HBO, and James Gunn’s DC Universe is officially back on track. When Gunn first announced a Green Lantern TV show inspired by True Detective, it seemed like a terrible idea. The Green Lanterns are space cops who travel the cosmos, fighting aliens on a wide variety of colorful planets, so why would you put them in a gritty, grounded, Earth-bound murder mystery?

But Lanterns’ series premiere quickly dispelled those concerns. This show isn’t shying away from superhero spectacle or the cosmic side of the universe; it’s fully embracing the world of costumed vigilantes, magical rings, and extraterrestrial supervillains. But at the same time, it does genuinely feel like an HBO mystery drama in the vein of True Detective or Mare of Easttown. A mass shooting on a football field is the kind of horrific, real-world crime that Rust Cohle or Mare Sheehan would investigate, but Lanterns has got Hal Jordan and John Stewart on the case.

The shooting itself was a fascinating mystery when it was first introduced, but that’s just the tip of the iceberg. The much-discussed twist ending of Lanterns’ series premiere reveals that, 10 years after the shooting, John finds Hal’s frozen corpse on that very same football field. Lanterns has hit the ground running with an incredible pilot episode, but there are a lot of unanswered questions and mysteries to resolve before the season 1 finale.

What Happened To Hal?

The final scene of Lanterns’ first episode seems to suggest that Hal is dead. But since we’re in a comic book world, that might not be the case. It’s possible that that’s not really Hal, and that it’s a shapeshifting alien who has taken Hal’s form. But if it is Hal, and Hal really is dead, then who killed him? This twist ending was a great bait-and-switch. At first, it seemed as though our primary mystery for the season would be the shooting, but Hal solves the shooting before the episode is over. The real mystery is what happened to Hal.

The alien that Hal thwarted is part of a much larger conspiracy, and that conspiracy would eventually get Hal killed (or so it seems) a decade later. The biggest unanswered question in Lanterns right now is what the heck happened to Hal. He seemed to be unstoppable — even without his Power Ring, he was able to hold his own pretty well — so whoever killed him and left his body to freeze must be quite the formidable foe.

Where Is Hal's Power Ring?

Hal’s corpse — or the thing that looks like Hal’s corpse — isn’t wearing his Power Ring. That ring is, of course, the source of the Green Lanterns’ power, and you don’t choose it; it chooses you. Whereas it’s relatively easy for someone to misplace their wedding ring, a Green Lantern’s Power Ring is a different situation entirely. It takes a lot of force to separate a Lantern from his ring.

It’s been suggested that, in the decade between the shooting and Hal’s supposed death, Hal lost his ring to Guy Gardner, who has since taken his place as Earth’s Green Lantern (and a key member of the Justice Gang). But if that’s the case, we need to know how it happened. Did Hal become disgraced and have to give up the mantle? Did Hal retire of his own volition and pass the ring on to Guy to live a more peaceful life? If it’s not on Guy’s finger, then where is Hal’s Power Ring?

What Does William Macon's Militia Have To Do With Hal's Fate?

After a run-in with the law, Hal and John are temporarily forbidden from leaving the town of Rushville, Nebraska, so they’re invited to join their lawyer Billy Macon and his family for dinner. One source of tension is Billy’s wife, Sheriff Kerry Kane, the no-nonsense local law enforcement who’s been butting heads with Hal and John since the case was opened. But there’s another source of tension: Billy’s dad, William, who seems to be raising a private army on his land.

There’s no way the first episode of Lanterns would introduce us to a burgeoning militia and not have them play a bigger role later down the line — they’re like Chekhov’s militia. William seemed shady from the moment we met him, so I doubt he’s training his own personal soldiers as a force of good. Since Hal’s body resurfaces in Rushville, and it’s clearly tied to this case, it’s possible that William’s militia had something to do with Hal’s grim fate.

Why Is Hal's Body On The Exact Same Football Field Where The Mass Shooting Happened?

It can’t be a coincidence that Hal’s body was discovered on the same football field where he’d investigated a mass shooting a decade earlier. When Hal deduced that Waylon Sanders was an alien in disguise, Sanders detonated a bomb inside his own body, preventing Hal from asking any further questions (and darn near killing the Green Lantern). It’s clear that the shooting wasn’t just a random act of violence; it was a calculated move in a much wider conspiracy. The shooting is just the beginning of a 10-year criminal plot that ultimately ends in Hal’s demise (or what looks like Hal’s demise — again, we still can’t know for sure if he’s really dead, or we’re witnessing more alien trickery).

Over the course of the next few weeks, as we see flashbacks to Hal and John’s investigation, we’ll start to see how this is all connected. We’ll finally see what’s so special about this football field, that the invading aliens made it the site of both a mass shooting and the death of a Green Lantern. I have no idea where it’s going, but I trust these writers to surprise us with a doozy of a twist.

What Is The Alien Seeking Vengeance For?

In the tense climactic scene of Lanterns’ series premiere, Sanders is interrogated by Hal. Despite Kerry’s best efforts to keep Hal and Sanders from being in the same room, Hal gets the chance to question Sanders about his possible alien affiliations, and gets the answer he was looking for. Sanders reveals that he’s an alien and that the shooting is just part of a much larger plot. The most noteworthy detail from Sanders’ confession is his motive: he came to Earth seeking “vengeance.”

So, Lanterns is a revenge story. Whatever the aliens are doing on Earth, whatever reason they have for committing senseless acts of terrorism in a tiny Nebraskan town, it’s all in the name of retribution for some past wrongdoing. Right now, it’s unclear exactly what the aliens are seeking revenge for, but a grave mistake from Hal’s past could come back to haunt him. It’s possible that one of Hal’s previous spacefaring adventures led to the destruction of these aliens’ homeworld, or that their leader is an old enemy of his.

The “buddy cop” dynamic at the heart of Lanterns is getting a lot of dramatic and comedic mileage out of the push-and-pull between the hotshot young rookie and the jaded old veteran. Forcing the rookie to answer for the veteran’s mistakes would be a great conflict for that dynamic. John grew up looking up to Hal, and he’s already learning the lesson that you should never meet your heroes. That relationship might be about to take an even darker turn if John starts investigating Hal’s death and finds himself paying for Hal’s sins.