Spoilers ahead for the Lanterns Season 1 finale.
Green Lantern fans know that John Stewart (Aaron Pierre) was always going to become one of Earth’s greatest defenders, but the path Lanterns It takes to get there makes the trip seem like a complete waste of time. Thanks to flashbacks to his traumatic childhood, we know that his relationship with fear, race, and the Lantern Corps itself was twisted by his parents’ training. He turned down the chance to become Earth’s next Green Lantern after Hal Jordan (Kyle Chandler) in 2016, but 10 years later, in Lanterns At the end of the season, he finally finds his way back to that responsibility on his own terms. Interestingly, it also moves him further away from the version of the character fans know and love from the comics, changing a fundamental aspect of Lanterns’ history in the process.
Surprisingly, John’s reconciliation involves the help of Sinestro (Ulrich Tommsen), a disgraced Lantern who was kicked out of the Corps after murdering a Guardian of the Universe. It’s a long story that ultimately means nothing in the grand plan, but he was freed from his prison on Oa and forced to forge a new lantern on a strange, unnamed planet. As this planet was contaminated by a chemical agent that instills fear in all its victims, the lantern he makes there is also imbued with fear and willpower.
As? Who knows: Lanterns He’s never been interested in explaining how this story works, and he doesn’t change his tone in the ending. The only thing that matters is that this “unauthorized” lantern will turn John into a very different kind of Green Lantern if he uses it to charge Hal’s old ring, which he literally ripped off Hal’s corpse. He’s not a Yellow Lantern, as many theorized… just an independent hero who doesn’t answer to the Corps and sets his own rules. Plus: his own Green Lantern oath. For some reason.
On the brightest day, on the darkest night…
Juan makes his own oath in the Lanterns end.
DC Studios
Just before John loads “his” ring into the lantern forged by Sinestro, he confesses to Hal (well… Hal’s stored hologram). in the ring) who has never actually fulfilled the Green Lantern oath. The Halogram tells him that he can make it work to meet his own needs and intentions, and tells him “don’t be afraid to be afraid” before disappearing forever.
John takes that advice to heart and devises a new oath that summarizes his modus operandi as a hero and acknowledges his relationship with fear:
“In the brightest day, in the darkest night,
I will accept my fear, I will do the right thing.
I choose this ring, I choose this fight,
At the service of the light of this lantern.”
It’s… a little hypocritical, considering that less than an hour before this promise, he let Hal’s killer and A Manhunter with half-baked plans for world domination walks free. If John intends to do the right thing, he’s off to a comically bad start. Said oath isn’t very good either, but hey, John is an architect, not a wordsmith. If only there were a prolific science fiction writer around to help him craft a stronger oath…
The Lantern Oath has defined the Corps for 80 years. Why has the time come to change things?
DC
There is more than one Green Lantern Oath, but what many consider the Corps’ definitive creed first appeared more than 80 years ago in Green Lantern #9. Alfred Bester, Hugo Award-winning author of several celebrated science fiction novels, wrote the original four-line engagement for Alan Scott, the Green Lantern of DC’s Golden Age. However, his work would become a fixture of Green Lantern lore: what began with Alan Scott was eventually adopted by Hal Jordan and, later, the entire Corps.
Again, many Lanterns modify the oath for their own purposes (even Alan had another catchphrase he would use in battle from time to time), but the oath Bester created for the comics is iconic for a reason. It’s a small piece of science fiction history, one that even newcomers to Green Lantern stories may be a little familiar with. That John doesn’t even get to say it when he realizes his destiny in Lanterns It just feels wrong, not to mention a little disrespectful to the stories that paved the way.
What about the original oath that didn’t fit John’s intentions as a hero? His desire to recognize the power of fear is valid, to a point, but it’s not like Hal’s creed makes any great condemnations of fear. Being a Green Lantern has always been more about willpower – the will to overcome fear, design great buildings and protect the innocent – than bravery. Lanterns has misunderstood that all along, and John’s new creed only takes that point further. He may call himself Lantern when the series comes to an end, but altering such a crucial Lantern story robs John of any chance of living up to that title. It might have been better if he had simply become a Yellow Lantern, if this is the best hero’s journey. Lanterns team could have dreamed of.