Sunday's episode of Lanterns divided opinions after establishing that John Stewart Sr. was offered the Green Lantern ring before Hal Jordan. However, his love for his family and the heavy socio-political reality he's faced as a Black man in America made him afraid.
The apparent insinuation that Hal "stole" the ring from a Black man has generated a lot of heated debates. Some have praised Lanterns' hard-hitting approach to racial issues, but others feel that framing Hal's selection in a way that can be interpreted as an advantage afforded by his white privilege is a misstep.
The suggestion that Hal could more easily appear "fearless" due to not experiencing the same societal fears is valid (his actual origin and the sources of his fearlessness will be explored in a future episode). Still, traditional Green Lantern lore centres on willpower and the ability to overcome fear as universal, individual qualities.
With that in mind, many fans have argued that the episode has rewritten why Hal is Green Lantern. At the same time, John's origin has been criticised as placing too much emphasis on his family's experiences with racism and his mother's influence, rather than his own individual agency and worthiness.
It's a complicated, hot-button issue. John's political awareness and the exploration of race also have roots in his 1970s comic origins, and Bernadette Stewart's perspective is presented as her interpretation shaped by experience, not necessarily the objective cosmic truth.
Still, as fans continue to argue about this creative direction for Lanterns, fuel has been added to the fire from an unexpected source.
It started when DC Studios Showcase: The Official Podcast host Frankey Smith took to Threads to write, "Hate to break it to ya but Hal is indeed a bit of a racist." When a fan took issue with that, Smith suggested he watch Paw Patrol instead of Lanterns and doubled down on Hal "canonically" being a racist, using this excerpt as an example:
In the late 1960s and early 1970s, the socially conscious Green Lantern/Green Arrow run by Dennis O’Neil and Neal Adams deliberately portrayed Hal as an establishment-oriented figure who was somewhat out of touch with Earth-bound social issues.
The Guardians of the Universe admonished Hal for saying John has a "chip on his shoulder," calling out his "petty bigotries." He also referred to his Inuit friend/sidekick Tom Kalmaku with the outdated and offensive nickname "Pieface," which has long been dropped and treated as a product of its era.
Now, Hal and John are routinely shown as equals and allies, and it would be misleading to describe Hal as "canonically" racist based solely on those early stories (any more than John is for labelling Hal "whitey" during the same era of now-outdated storytelling).
You can read the exchange in the X posts below.