The first season of HBO’s Lanterns ended Sunday night by naming the person who killed Hal Jordan, and the answer is Kerry Kane, the Nebraska sheriff who had spent the series helping to find his killer.
The finale, titled “Dirt and Stars,” rewinds to 2016 in Rushville, where a siege had left much of the town in ruins. Jordan, played by Kyle Chandler, expects the Guardians to prosecute him. “Kind of a nice, clean solution to their problem of me,” he tells Kane, played by Kelly Macdonald. He serves a 10-year sentence, returns to a hostile town and finds his house firebombed.
Kane’s teenage son, Noah, saves him by using Manhunter technology to regrow his burned skin. The rescue exposes the secret at the heart of the season. Noah is a Manhunter hybrid, created years earlier when a Manhunter used her regeneration machine on Kane’s severed finger. Jordan tries to persuade Kane to flee with her son and plans an escape that frightens her. She shoots him in the bleachers of the football field, then calls John Stewart to investigate the death. Stewart, played by Aaron Pierre, later pieces the truth together.
Noah, terrified that his programming will one day make him violent, asks Stewart to kill him. Stewart refuses, but he takes Jordan’s ring and a lantern built by Sinestro, who had been freed from prison by Noah. One account says Sinestro hoped Jordan would use the lantern to kill the boy. Stewart declines to arrest Kane, judging that Jordan would not have wanted it. In a last scene, Jordan’s ghostly Halogram tells Stewart his final words were “I love you” and jokes back.
The season closes with Stewart accepting his role as Earth’s protector. He then uses the Green Lantern signal to call Guy Gardner, played by Nathan Fillion.
Reviewers split on the execution. One recap praised the way the finale lets two truths stand and gives Stewart a clear destination. Another said the hour crams several major revelations about Noah, Sinestro and the new lantern into a single episode.
HBO has not announced a second season. The eight-episode series, created by Chris Mundy, Damon Lindelof and Tom King, premiered August 16.
