Lanterns creators explain changing Hal Jordan’s origin story and what it means for his future

With only one episode of Lanterns left, the show has made a pretty massive change to one of Hal Jordan’s most important origin details, and the creators have now explained why.

Episode 7 gives us a much deeper look at Hal’s childhood and the events that shaped him. We also learn that the death of his father, Martin Jordan, wasn’t actually the accident we know from the comics. Instead, Lanterns reveals that Martin deliberately crashed his plane after struggling with the same pain that had affected his own father.

In the comics, Martin Jordan dies in a test flight accident. But Lanterns gives his death a much darker explanation. The Halogram tells John Stewart that Martin believed his family would be better off without him. He also reveals that the same pain had affected his grandfather.

Martin left a note for Hal to read after his death, explaining that the pain had been passed down from his own father. “They called it the Jordan Boys Legacy,” Hal explains.

He then says, “Man, I’m not fearless because I’m brave. I’m fearless because I’m broken.”

Basically, the show is giving us a completely different way of understanding why Hal acts the way he does.

The creators wanted to make Hal more complicated

Kyle Chandler, who plays Hal, told TheWrap, “It’s more to build into the character. It’s more history. It’s more darkness. And it’s more pathology of the character. There’s a lot going on with these two dudes.”

He also pointed, “As I’ve said before, and (Aaron) can speak for himself, but Hal had a pretty rough coming up in the world, all the stuff that happened, getting the ring, knowing about my family’s past, but look at his childhood! laughs I mean, come on!”

According to showrunner and co-creator Chris Mundy, the Jordan Boys Legacy twist was introduced just before filming began. That meant Chandler knew about Hal’s new history early enough to build it into his performance.

“Before we rolled camera, he knew the pain his character held so that he could incorporate that however he does, in his sort of brilliant way, into the performance he was giving,” Mundy said.

The new backstory also gives the show a much darker explanation for Hal’s fearlessness. The Halogram tells John that he is worried the real Hal might have taken his own life too, continuing the Jordan Boys Legacy. That is obviously a huge part of Hal’s story now, because it changes how we look at everything he has done throughout the series.

Chandler said the change helped him realise that Lanterns was going to be “a different type of superhero story”.

Co-creator explains why they changed the comics

And the creators clearly knew they were taking a big risk by changing such an important part of Hal’s comic book history. Lanterns co-creator Damon Lindelof said, “When you’re playing around with the canon, you have to treat it like you’re handling plutonium.”

He added, “But at the same time, there’s kind of no fun and creativity and originality in that. So you simultaneously sort of have to start to kind of iterate.”

Lindelof said the writers were constantly asking themselves how they could expand the existing canon without completely breaking it.

“Ultimately, it’s sort of like, what is the basis of the character? Is Batman still Batman if his parents aren’t killed? Is Superman still Superman if there’s a Krypton? And is Hal Jordan still Hal Jordan if his dad didn’t die in a test flight?” Lindelof said.

He added, “Probably not, but then, ‘Can you recontextualise the death?’ is the way that we approached it.”

Lindelof also explained that the writers were interested in what Hal’s fearlessness actually means. “Are there different contextual frameworks for fearlessness that are more relatable to the time that we live in now? That is to say, do I actually know anybody who’s presenting as fearless, and what’s at the heart of that fearlessness?” he said.

He then explained, “We would say to Tom (King), ‘Is there anything in the canon that would suggest that Hal’s dad dying wasn’t an accident?’ Then he would reference something.”

And with only one episode left, we still have to see exactly what happened to the real Hal Jordan and how all of this connects to his fate.

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