Ever since DC hired James Gunn and Peter Safran, there’s been an air of expectation and anticipation that Gunn can and will fix what ails the DC Extended Universe (DCEU). So, far, it’s been very interesting. Gunn tried to provide notes to Joker: Folie à Deux to director Todd Phillips, but Phillips apparently knew what the “audience wanted” better than Gunn when it came to comics content. It’s definitely worth mentioning that neither Joker film is actually meant to be current canon as they were greenlit and approved before Gunn came on. They just happen to be the only project from DC that we can currently examine, but that is about to change in its own interesting scenario. Remember The Penguin is part of Matt Reeves’ Batman universe, which runs alongside whatever Gunn will create.
It is no secret that Warner Brothers is having massive problems. There’s the $40 billion the company currently has in debt, which is just… oof. They also seem to be unable to or unwilling to make the video games they were once known for making, instead releasing piss poor live service titles like Suicide Squad or games like Gotham Knights, which somehow managed to take a simple fighting style the company had perfected and somehow mess it up, which led to an extremely derivative title that fans soured on literally minutes into playing. But Warner Brothers has a solution!
That’s right, they’ve come up with the perfect plan create quality content as well as incredibly amazing quality content. There will now be HBO shows and Max shows, as the company felt like they needed to “delinate between what” will be branded with HBO and what will be branded as Max. If you’re confused as to the difference, welcome to the club. Fortunately, I have fantastic news if you’re a DC fan or a fan of HBO originals.
DC officially announced an eight-episode HBO original series called Lanterns. Adding to that, they’ve cast two Green Lanterns already. The series will now star Aaron Pierre as John Stewart. Pierre just starred in the new Netflix film Rebel Ridge, which has been chilling in Netflix Top 10 as well as holding that coveted No. 1 spot for three weeks. This isn’t even his first foray into DC as he had previously shown up in the DC series Krypton where he played the role of Dev-Em, who is a spoiled little brat constantly starting crap.
Lanterns also announced that Kyle Chandler would be playing Hal Jordan. DC has even provided fans with a logline as to what the series will entail. It honestly sound pretty cool and I am gonna check it out. The logline states: “new recruit John Stewart and Lantern legend Hal Jordan, two intergalactic cops drawn into a dark, earth-based mystery as they investigate a murder in the American heartland.”
Essentially, if you’re into stuff like True Detective or Justified, then Lanterns is going to be right up your alley. I’m a big fan of having grounded stories driven by characters in the comics, so there is a ton of potential for greatness with this show. At least according to my perspective, anyhow. I think DC needs more grounded stories to draw the fans in before they go huge, cosmic, or multiversal. If fans haven’t been able to spend time with the characters and see them go through at least some “human” processes, in this case they’re investigating a crime, they simply aren’t going to care about what happens to them when you bring in some world-ending threat. Lanterns seems poised to avoid that and I’m a big fan of that.
What do you think? Are you going to check the show out? Do you think James Gunn and Peter Safran can even save this project or has the ship sailed due to superhero fatigue? There’s a lot at play and both DC and Marvel find themselves on the precipice of being labeled “junk comic films” once again. Only time will tell if they can avoid those fates.
