Hal Jordan easily becomes the highlight of the episode for me. Lanterns Episode 6, titled “Bad Optics,” ends with John Stewart quietly breaking into a fresh grave, and the reason has almost nothing to do with grief.
Ten years after the Manhunter disaster tore Rushville apart, John is still living in its shadow. Hal went to prison, John became an architect, and the town never forgave either of them. When Hal’s body turns up with no ring and a bullet in his head, tying directly back to the Lanterns premiere, John’s first move is to get that ring back onto his old mentor’s hand, whatever it takes.
The Real Reason John Wanted Hal’s Ring
John frames the request to Guy Gardner as a matter of respect. Hal, in his telling, deserves to be buried in his Green Lantern uniform and ring rather than as an ordinary man. Guy agrees to retrieve the decommissioned ring from Oa, even though helping with the murder investigation itself is off the table given the optics of a Green Lantern getting involved.
The funeral that follows is small and quiet. Only John, Sheriff Kerry, and Hal’s former girlfriend Carol Ferris show up, and Carol brings along a eulogy Hal wrote for himself years earlier, which John ends up reading graveside. It plays as a genuinely moving scene, right up until it isn’t the whole story.
That night, John returns alone and digs the coffin back up. The actual plan hinges on a voice-locked vault Hal left behind in a storage unit, one that a simple recording of his voice can’t open. So John pulls the ring from Hal’s finger to activate what the show calls sentry protocol, using it to summon Hal’s stored holographic backup instead.
What the Halogram Means for the Murder Case
The Halogram gives John something he desperately needs: an active, morally complicated ally who isn’t quite Hal but knows everything Hal knew. Its first line after looking down at its own corpse is a blunt, profane reaction that undercuts the solemnity of everything that came before. It’s a sharp tonal swing, and it’s clearly the point.
The timing matters too. Earlier in the episode, Guy mentions that Sinestro has broken out of his prison somewhere off world, a detail that doesn’t connect to Hal’s death yet but clearly isn’t sitting in the script by accident. Between an unsolved murder in Rushville and a dangerous escapee loose in the cosmos, John digging up his old friend for information feels less like desperation and more like the only move left on the board.
Hal Jordan is gone as the Green Lantern of Earth, a title that’s already passed through John and now sits with Guy. But the Halogram means Hal isn’t finished shaping the story he left behind.
Lanterns releases new episodes Sundays at 9 p.m. ET on HBO and HBO Max.
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