The series premiere of the new DCU series, Lanterns, is now streaming on HBO, and despite some backlash against the ending and the perception that the show feels tonally mismatched to other DCU projects (James Gunn addresses this below), "Pilot" seems to have gone over pretty well with DC Comics fans.
The episode features several nods and references to Green Lantern lore that could lay the groundwork for what's to come, but one eagle-eyed viewer has also spotted a nod to classic Batman villain Roman Sionis, aka Black Mask.
Towards the end of the premiere, a poster for Janus Cosmetics can be seen behind John Stewart (Aaron Pierre). The artwork features a logo along with an image of a woman's face partially obscured by black feathers.
Janus Cosmetics was one of the brands owned by Sionis in the comics, and when his company went under, the ruthless crime boss was forced to accept a bailout from Wayne Enterprises. This humiliation drove the already unstable Sionis deeper into madness, and put Bruce Wayne on the villain's hitlist alongside his costumed alter-ego.
Black Mask was previously played in live-action by Ewan McGregor Birds of Prey and Peter Outerbridge in Batwoman.
Gunn has also taken to Threads to address the Lanterns' "tonal shift" after one fan said that he can't "comprehend this slate toward building a shared narrative universe."
"In the same way DC comics have," said the DC Studios co-CEO. "Certainly the DC works of Alan Moore, Darwyn Cooke, Grant Morrison, Jack Kirby, Paul Dini & Tom King can't be considered 'of one tone.
For me and others raised on DC comics, a huge part of the fun was enjoying a variety of stories in various genres and seeing inventive ways these tones interacted & interwove. For some of the authors — notably Moore and Morrison (and Tom King in Strange Adventures and more), that tonal interweaving became a part of the stories themselves."
HBO in association with Warner Bros. Television and DC Studios. The pilot episode is co-written by Chris Mundy, Damon Lindelof, and Tom King, who are co-creators for the series. Mundy serves as showrunner. The first two episodes are directed by James Hawes, with Stephen Williams, Geeta Vasant Patel, and Alik Sakharov also tapped to direct. The series is executive produced by Mundy, Lindelof, James Gunn, Peter Safran, King, Ron Schmidt, and Hawes. Based on the DC comic characters from Green Lantern.
The series stars Kyle Chandler, Aaron Pierre, Kelly Macdonald, Garret Dillahunt, Poorna Jagannathan, Laura Linney, Jason Ritter, Ulrich Thomsen, Nathan Fillion, J. Alphonse Nicholson, and Jasmine Cephas Jones.
The series follows new recruit John Stewart (Aaron Pierre) and Lantern legend Hal Jordan (Kyle Chandler), two intergalactic cops drawn into a dark, earth-based mystery as they investigate a murder in the American heartland.
"This is a story of a couple of Green Lanterns John Stewart and Hal Jordan," James Gunn said of the project when it was first announced. "We have a few other Lanterns peppered in there but this is really a terrestrial based TV show which is almost like True Detective with a couple of Green Lanterns who are space cops watching over Precinct Earth in it they discover a terrifying mystery that ties into our largest story of the DCU."