In episode 7 of Lanterns, now streaming on HBO Max, the superhero series has officially rewritten a core rule of Green Lantern mythology: John Stewart (Aaron Pierre) can sustain his power constructs without a ring, a capability that appears to make him potentially the most powerful Green Lantern ever.
The revelation arrives a decade after the series’ protagonist abandoned his life in Rushville and any connection to cosmic powers to build his architectural firm. What began as a subtle hint — John unconsciously manifested a living bird with a Green Lantern ring in an earlier episode and kept it alive after surrendering his ring to Hal Jordan (Kyle Chandler) — has now crystallized into a definitive statement about how the Green Lantern powers work in this version of the DC Universe.
The Hal-ogram Does What Hal Never Could
At the close of episode 6, John retrieved the ring from Hal’s corpse, channeled a fraction of its energy, and projected the Hal-ogram, the digital backup of Hal’s consciousness stored within the ring. The projection itself was not unprecedented — viewers had seen it twice before — but episode 7 makes clear that this iteration of the Hal-ogram operates under entirely new rules, and the difference traces directly to the fact that John is the one wearing the ring.
Green Lantern lore has long held that constructs vanish the moment a wearer loses concentration or removes the ring that supplies their power. Yet John’s bird endured without a ring, surviving even when he was forcibly knocked unconscious, and later clashed with the human-looking aliens who had abducted him — a feat his captors called “practically impossible.” Episode 7 removes any lingering doubt. The Hal-ogram, initially dismissed as a straightforward data backup from 2006, now demonstrates awareness of real-world events, refuses to speak until John agrees to bring him to see Sheriff Kerry Kane (Kelly Macdonald), and spontaneously appears in the passenger seat when John thinks of Hal — even after John deliberately removed the ring.
“How are you doing that?” Hal asks, genuinely shocked. “That’s not possible. I don’t know any Lanterns that can do that. Hell, I can’t even do that.”
Hal Jordan, Lanterns
The moment marks a turning point in the relationship between the two heroes. Where the real Hal had offered only reluctant approval earlier, he now grants John full recognition: “Bravo. Well fucking done, trainee. That’s amazing! It’s goddamn incredible.”
A New Understanding of Lantern Power
The series is careful not to fully explain the mechanics at play, but the evidence mounts steadily. As the Hal-ogram tries to persuade John to bring him to Kerry, he estimates roughly an hour of “talk time” remaining while the ring runs low on power — yet the projection accompanies John through numerous journeys, stands beside Guy Gardner’s Green Lantern beacon, and even follows them through a black-goo portal to the homeworld of Antaan (Paul Ben-Victor). Across a barren wasteland, a lake, and the approach to Sinestro (Ulrich Thomsen)’s isolated hideout, the Hal-ogram remains continuously manifested.
The implication becomes undeniable when John, rowing alone afterward, is driven to hallucinate by the fear-inducing substance that drove Antaan’s entire race to suicide. Falling into the water, he is pulled back to safety by a Hal-ogram that materialized on its own — a digital backup inside a nearly dead ring that has somehow become an autonomous, hard-light being capable of perceiving its surroundings and protecting the man sustaining it.
Like the little green bird that first hinted at this power, the Hal-ogram now exists as an entity independent of John yet intrinsically tied to him. The open question is whether John has simply accessed Hal’s blueprint within the ring and forged something entirely new through his own willpower, or whether something deeper explains his rule-breaking ability — one that Bernadette was right to suspect all along.
Looking Ahead
For now, John remains more interested in unraveling the mystery of the previous Lantern’s death than in embracing his own destiny. But with only the finale remaining for Lanterns, the series appears poised to push John toward finally accepting his powers — and perhaps to reveal the full reason why he may be destined to become the most powerful Green Lantern of them all.
Lanterns is streaming on HBO Max.
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