The in-development DC Universe series Lanterns can finally deliver on the Sinestro tease first made in the 2011 Green Lantern movie. Under the newly formed DC Studios, James Gunn's and Peter Safran's DC Universe plans are intended to properly commence in 2025 with Superman: Legacy. This will kick off the DCU's first chapter, titled "Gods and Monsters," with other projects including the Green Lantern-centric TV series titled Lanterns.
Hal Jordan and John Stewart will be the primary Green Lantern heroes in Lanterns, which is said to be heavily influenced by True Detective with a space cop twist. Little other information has been revealed about Lanterns so far, including its place in James Gunn's general DC Universe plans, but there is also a good chance that Green Lantern's archenemy Thaal Sinestro will have a significant presence on the show. In turn, this means that Lanterns could really dive into the full extent of Sinestro's villainy that Green Lantern did not.
DC Universe's Lanterns Show Can Deliver Sinestro As The Villain
Sinestro is a major character in 2011's Green Lantern, portrayed by Mark Strong and acting as the commanding officer of the Green Lantern Corps. Sinestro persuades the Guardians of the Universe to forge a yellow ring wielding the energy of fear to combat the rampaging Parallax (voiced by Clancy Brown). Though Hal Jordan (Ryan Reynolds) manages to defeat Parallax with his green Power Ring, Green Lantern's end-credits scene shows Sinestro putting on the yellow ring. This set Sinestro up as the villain of the Green Lantern 2 that never happened, but Lanterns can remedy that.
While Mark Strong's performance as Sinestro was generally praised, Green Lantern left his villainous potential unrealized as a result of the movie's poor reception and box office failure. With Lanterns, the fear-based evil that Sinestro represents can be central the series in a way that Green Lantern was ultimately not able to present. With that said, Lanterns will also probably take a new path with the character.
How Lanterns' Sinestro Will Likely Be Different From 2011's Green Lantern
In the interest of making the Sinestro of Lanterns distinct from that of Green Lantern, the former seems much less likely to present him in a mentor role to Hal or John or in the same kind of leadership position within the Green Lantern Corps. Of course, with both elements still essential to Sinestro's comic book history, that does not mean Chapter 1 of James Gunn's DC Universe will overlook this aspect of the character. Instead, Lanterns would be wiser to recount the history of Sinestro in flashbacks or a fabled retelling among Hal, John, and their allies.
Ideally, Sinestro's history could be presented as a kind of "tale of the fallen Lantern" story working in tandem with his role on the show. By going this route, Lanterns can not only show Sinestro himself as a direct antagonist of Hal and John, but present his powers of wielding the energy of fear and his leadership of the Sinestro Corps as core elements of the show. For as ill-received as Ryan Reynolds's Green Lantern film was (with Reynolds himself openly disparaging it since), it still teased the kind of megalomaniacal villain Sinestro could be. Lanterns could finally be where Green Lantern's most sworn enemy gets to unleash exactly that.
