on Google Preferred Source Google News Link copied to clipboard By Corey Plante Published Aug 23, 2026, 10:00 PM EDT DC John Stewart’s impossible construct reveals just how powerful he could become on Lanterns and beyond
Image: HBO Add Us Add on Google Preferred Source Google News Like Like follow Follow followed Followed Thread 1 Log in Here is a fact-based summary of the story contents: Try something different: Show me the facts Explain it like I’m 5 Give me a lighthearted recap In 2014’s Justice League: War , heroes including Superman, Wonder Woman, and the Flash unite to defend Earth from an invasion led by Darkseid. Batman and Green Lantern are among the first to stumble into an uneasy partnership. As they pursue an alien through Gotham’s sewers, Hal Jordan spends much of their first conversation flying behind Batman and showing off. When he finally lands, the Dark Knight casually slips the ring from Hal’s finger. The green costume and powers immediately disappear. He regains his Green Lantern powers only after summoning the ring back to his hand.
Adapted from Geoff Johns and Jim Lee’s 2011 Justice League #1 , the scene is a funny distillation of both characters. Hal is powerful and cocky. Batman is observant enough to identify and steal the source of that power within minutes. It also dramatizes one of the Green Lantern mythology’s basic rules: The ring transforms willpower into physical hard-light constructs, but a Lantern has to be wearing the ring to wield that power.
HBO’s Lanterns just pushed that rule to its apparent limit — and potentially set John Stewart up to become the most powerful Green Lantern in the DC Universe .
Note: Spoilers follow for Lanterns episode 2.
In Lanterns episode 2, John Stewart (Aaron Pierre) maintains an intricate, autonomous construct while separated from the ring and after repeatedly losing consciousness. The Green Lantern comics contain a handful of comparable feats, but they usually involve veteran Lanterns, unusual rings, or cosmic transformations. John accomplishes it after just two months of training, which already makes him seem like a prodigy among the Corps.
Despite the fact that John has been training with Hal Jordan (Kyle Chandler) for two months when Lanterns begins, he still hasn’t learned how to fly. The episode opens with John’s first flight lesson (although Hal selfishly just wants John to fly so he can retrieve the lantern they need to recharge the ring). Hal doesn’t have much good advice to give other than, “Think ‘flight.’” On John’s second attempt, instead of taking to the skies, he conjures a small bird. Hal reacts with an incredulous, “What the fuck is that!?” He’s shocked, even confused — because that’s not really supposed to happen.
Image: HBO The constructs created by the vast majority of Green Lanterns are hollow: bubbles like the one Hal used to contain the explosion at the end of episode 1, big fists, simple shields, etc. According to DC’s official description of John Stewart, however, he’s unique among Lanterns: “A former architect, Stewart creates his power ring constructs differently from his fellow Lanterns, as they are never hollow,” it reads. “He always builds them from the inside out, down to the last nut and bolt — the result of his keen architectural mind.”
Lanterns doesn’t present John as an architect, but he does have artistic inclinations. It’s easy to miss, but while Hal is interrogating the alien at the end of episode 1, John makes an incredibly det…