Lanterns won’t be lacking its’ comic book flare! Series director James Hawes tips his hand on what fans can expect from the upcoming DC Universe project.
With production on Lanterns officially in full swing, fans have been keeping a close eye on the series. The project is set to be the zeitgeist’s reintroduction to the Green Lantern corner of the DC Universe following Ryan Reynolds’ disastrous big screen debut, a project whose failure haunts the franchise nearly 15 years later. Suffice to say, the heat is on for the creative team to deliver a real win.
Luckily for Green Lantern fans, it seems as though they’re delivering. James Hawes, who will serve as a director on the series, recently sat down with Collider to discuss the project. He clearly had no shortage of good things to say about Lanterns, emphasizing that the show has plenty of humor, even while being a truly engaging page-turner just from the scripts alone.
“There is a very particular humor that they brought to this,” Hawes explained. “It’s very rooted in a way that I like to think we achieve with Slow Horses, that I achieve with things like my Black Mirror‘s, and yet there is a rich vein of humor running through it. So, again, it was about that tone. I’m such a huge fan of Damon [Lindelof] and Chris [Mundy] and the writing that they’ve done in the past.”
“Listen, it all starts from the script. When you turn those pages, can you get the smell of it? You always find a scene or two that you think, ‘I can’t wait to be stood beside the camera and the cast, directing this scene on the day.’ If that happens on turning the pages, you know this is something you have to take seriously, and that absolutely happened with Lanterns.”
Will Lanterns Be A Grounded Series?
One of the biggest worries fans have had with how Lanterns has been presented thus far is that the series appears to be incredibly grounded. Given the cosmic nature of the Green Lantern Corps, there’s a worry that the project may lose the magic of the original comic. However, director James Hawes takes great care to emphasize that the creative spark will be maintained in the DC Universe’s first (new) prestige series since the reboot.
“To some extent, it’s a swerve. Superheroes are not somewhere I’ve really played before, but it’s created in such a way—and I can’t tell you much—that it bewitched me. It doesn’t lack its sci-fi magic, but it’s done in a world where you accept that these things just are. They don’t need that extra sprinkle of sci-fi fairy dust. It works within a physical world that we’ve come to know.”
“I don’t think I can tease that yet. You’ve talked about the rootedness with James [Gunn]. It’s an extraordinary combination of cast. I’ve been on the set the last four-and-a-bit weeks; the way the cast is landing is electric. I’m thrilled by who we’ve got here. I don’t think DC fans will be in any way disappointed…”
It’s certainly interesting to hear that Lanterns will retain its more magical elements, especially given other members of the Green Lantern Corps have already been cast in the DC Universe. Only time will tell if the series will be able to salvage the reputation of the IP. However, if James Hawes is to be believed, fans likely have one heck of a time in store in the near future!
The Green Lantern series Lanterns is currently in production for HBO. Stay tuned for the latest news regarding the future of the DC Universe and make sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel for more content!
