Watch on youtube here: We’ve decided to keep these podcasts free without a paid subscription but they do take a lot of time and effort (mostly on Russ’ side) to put together. So, if you can please subscribe at $5/month. We’re going to be expanding podcasts like this to new shows and even developing more research intensive series on movie history. Russ’ notes from episode three: -In the beginning of the episode, John’s trip through the dead mall features a poster in the background for Janus Cosmetics. On the one hand, that’s a tie into Clayface, the next DC Studios movie, which is a body horror story based on one of Batman’s villains. On the other hand, my mind immediately went to The Janus Directive, a storyline that ran through Checkmate!, Suicide Squad, Manhunter, Firestorm, and Captain Atom in 1989. That Manhunter is not the same as the Manhunters featured in Lanterns, but there are aesthetic similarities, because DC is bound and determined to make the whole Manhunter thing as confusing as humanly possible. -In subtitles, the episode revealed that Laura Linney is playing Lianna. It’s impossible to know exactly how much of her backstory they will keep for the show, but in the comics, she was a Guardian only very briefly before becoming a bad guy for a minute and then eventually a member of the Omega Men, a team Tom King wrote juuuuuust before he exploded into the mainstream. . -The Guardians of the Universe (in the comics) are born out of the Maltusians, but at some point the women of Maltus left to form a new Amazon-like race called the Zamarons. Carol Ferris, Hal Jordan’s on-again/off-again girlfriend, is a Star Sappire – the “violet lanterns” who work for the Zamarons. -Lianna, despite being born a Guardian, doesn’t physically resemble Guardians or Zamarons. She looks more like a distaff Lobo (not the first, or last, of those at DC). During her time with the Zamarons, she was recruited into a cult and grown from childhood to adulthood by something called the Heartstone, a cosmic gem that was present at the dawn of time. That’s interesting, considering she was wandering around handing out gems in this episode. Emerald City Video is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. -So - John Stewart’s origin here is batshit relative to the comics. Here’s how the DC Wiki describes his youth: “Born in Detroit, Michigan, most of John’s life was marked by poverty and clashes with police. His mother was a community organizer, who tried to make things better, and inspired John to try and make the world a better place.[3] He also had a little sister named Eleanor, who died when they were children.[4] Once he finished high school, John felt it was time to leave home and joined the U.S. Marine Corps. His mother didn’t like it, fearing John would be contributing to the American military industrial complex, but John felt it was the only way to pay his way to college and that protest without action is not enough.” -In his original appearances, John had a more “Black power, fight the system” kind of personality, but in the modern era he has been essentially rewritten as one of those Black conservatives who rebels against his hippie parents. -I still really don’t like the whole Lantern Eugenics storyline, but I’ll admit that the left-field prediction that John’s dad was a potential Lantern panned out! Good job, Dave! -The racial politics of this episode feel very confused to me, and her “Hal never had a hard time because white privilege” line feels even weirder coming AFTER we know that Hal watched his dad die and basically is dead inside. The resentment they have for Jordan very much does feel like a nod to the Shazam! story we talked about before. The difference between being programmed and being raised boils down to free will. Which actually leads me to an interesting point: Lanterns has no apparent interest in willpower, which is actually the engine that drives the Green Lantern rings. Being “fearless” is primarily important because it places a Lantern in opposition to the yellow Lanterns – Sinestro’s Corps – which fuels itself on the fear it instills in others. It’s also interesting that the word “will” finally comes up in this episode – only when Lianna asks whether John harbors any ill will toward Hal. -There’s graffiti in the background for the Midway City Panthers when John is abandoned by his parents in the “bad part of town.” Midway City is a fictional city in DC Comics. It’s in Michigan, which hints that maybe John is from Midway rather than Detroit in this version. In the comics, Hawkman, Hawkwoman, and the Doom Patrol live in Midway. In movies and TV, it’s often used as a “generic DC location,” most notably in David Ayer’s Suicide Squad movie. It was referenced a number of times in the Arrowverse as “a place people have gone,” but never featured. -The Gray Wolf is indeed a DC Comics character, although I think this is more an Iron Man 3/Arrow season 1 situation where they’re taking a name used by a character in the comics and dropping it on a random “bad dude.” In the comics, Gray Wolf is the name used by two different characters (or different versions of the same character? It’s hard to tell with a multiverse) who debuted in 1971. He was originally an enemy of the Western hero Tomahawk, who married a girl Gray Wolf was interested in. A later version (whose costume looks very similar, but modernized for the 2010s) was part of the Batman family of characters starting in 2022. He was originally installed to oversee a prison and drug prisoners by Lex Luthor, but eventually rebelled and cured people. -The alcoholic version of Hal strikes again! And, yes, use of the ring to interfere in politics is strictly forbidden, as Guy noted in Superman. That may be why he’s on ice in 2026 and John has the ring in Man of Tomorrow. -Who is the bearded Guardian? I have some thoughts but it’s hard to have any kind of confidence at this point. One candidate might be Krona, and if that’s who he is, we are all in for a bad time. Thanks for reading Emerald City Video! This post is public so feel free to share it. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit russburlingame.substack.com/subscribe
