The clever clues in Lanterns that exposed who the Manhunter was way before the big reveal

Lanterns has finally revealed the identity of its Manhunter, and the answer was hiding in plain sight much earlier than you probably realised.

Episode four reveals that Zoe, played by Poorna Jagannathan, is the Manhunter hiding in Rushville. But the show had already dropped several clues about her in the earlier episodes.

So, here are all the details in HBO Max’s Lanterns that exposed who the Manhunter was.

Zoe getting close to John was a huge clue

John and Zoe’s relationship initially looks like a separate romantic storyline. But John is also one of the two Lanterns investigating the mysterious alien in Rushville. That makes Zoe’s decision to get close to him much more significant in hindsight.

Jagannathan explained the character’s strategy to Entertainment Weekly, “She basically identifies her biggest threat and will have s*x with them. Do you know what I mean? That’s her MO.”

She also said Zoe would “initiate the most intimate relationship with a person who has anything to do with her extinction”.

Hal and John kept calling the Manhunter ‘he’

Even though Hal and John knew the Manhunter was a shapeshifting synthetic being, they repeatedly referred to the hidden figure as “he” when talking about the mystery. That wording makes the audience naturally picture a man too, which helps Zoe stay completely off the radar.

After the reveal, that tiny detail feels much more deliberate.

Zoe kept trying to make John leave

In episode four, Zoe visits John at his motel and tells him their relationship has to end. More importantly, she keeps pushing him to leave Rushville. At the time, it looks like Zoe is simply trying to escape the danger surrounding William. But after the reveal, her behaviour makes much more sense.

She needs John out of town before he gets any closer to the truth. When he refuses, she fakes her death and sends John and Hal towards Hector.

The woman who saved William was Zoe

William previously explained that a mysterious benefactor saved him when he was dying from cancer. Then we learn that Zoe was the nurse who treated him.

Zoe even tells John, “He was dying when I met him, and I saved his life.”

It’s actually a major clue once we know she is the Manhunter. Zoe was there when William was at his weakest, and she was the person who saved him. That also fits what Hal explains about Manhunters: They are programmed to latch onto the weak points of societies.

And then there is the empty hospital

Zoe was a nurse, and the hospital in Rushville is shown as strangely empty. That stands out because Manhunters are designed to find vulnerable points and exploit them. So the implication is that Zoe may have been using her position as a nurse to reach people when they were at their most vulnerable, helping them and building trust in the process.

It would also explain why the hospital being empty feels so strange in hindsight. If Zoe was curing people and gaining their trust, she was doing exactly what a Manhunter’s programming would push her to do.

The show has not directly explained that every patient was cured by Zoe, but it definitely is a convincing theory.

William wasn’t necessarily the person in control

William has the compound, the militia and the advanced technology, so it is easy to assume he is the most powerful person in the Macon household. But Zoe has remarkable freedom. She is able to spend time with John and move around William’s world without appearing particularly worried about him.

Also, William doesn’t seem like the kind of person who would know his wife was cheating on him and simply be okay with it. So, there has to be more going on between them. Once we know Zoe is the Manhunter, their relationship looks very different.

The show had already told us who the Manhunter was. We just weren’t looking at Zoe.

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