We’re officially halfway through the first season of Lanterns on HBO, and the series has been one that puts the cosmic side of DC Comics on its head. In truth, this was expected, as the series was long teased as being more inspired by the likes of True Detective and would center on an Earth-bound mystery for the likes of Hal Jordan and John Stewart rather than seeing them take on their Green Lantern Corps duties in the far reaches of Sector 2814. This week’s episode of Lanterns, though, puts the plot into overdrive in a big way, as Hal Jordan and John Stewart’s investigation to find the Manhunter in Rushville gets taken up a notch.
Their investigation uncovers a slew of details about this bizarre little town and the amount of detail that the Manhunter has gone to to cover their tracks and give themselves a lot of cover, which includes bringing in countless other people to do their bidding and make the trail to find them difficult. Among the people that Hal and John encounter was one name that should make every Green Lantern fan’s ears perk up…Hector Hammond, an iconic DC villain. Lanterns had another twist up its sleeve, though.
The search for the Manhunter in Rushville gets deadly in this week’s episode when it appears that Zoe Macon (Poorna Jagannathan) appears to explode from a random laser from space firing down on her car and blowing her up. Hal Jordan quickly finds the source of the laser, though, flying up to the atmosphere to grab the satellite, which Sheriff Kane identifies as Atlas Inc, a company the database she checks reveals was founded by…Hector Hammond.
That name should immediately raise the eyebrows for longtime Green Lantern fans, in part because Hector Hammond is a longtime antagonist for the character but also because it might have fans assuming that a guy with a giant head is about to show up. When the character arrives, though, his head is a very normal size, and though he does his best to intimidate both Hal Jordan and John Stewart, the former sees through him entirely.
Thanks to an intimidating growl from Jordan, Hector Hammond and his normal-sized head reveal the truth to the Lanterns: his real name isn’t Hector Hammond after all; it’s Hector Gutierrez. Furthermore, he works for the Manhunter and has for decades.
Now, the fact that Lanterns has revealed this isn’t really Hector Hammond, but instead Hector Gutierrez, could mean that the show was hedging its bets and simply offering up an Easter egg to fans so that a “real” version of the villain could appear down the line in the DCU. That would be the easiest explanation, but given the history already set by Lanterns, it seems more likely that the series has made it impossible for the character to show up anyway.
As established in the first episode of Lanterns, Hal Jordan has been the power-ring-wearing superhero for decades at this point. The fact that he didn’t react to the name Hector Hammond in any sort of way indicates that Hal has never encountered the villain across his years of being Green Lantern. But on top of that, using the name for a throwaway gag in the show (clearly designed for fans to do the Leo meme at the screen upon hearing it) means that a proper use of Hammond down the line might not actually carry any weight.
Now, let’s be clear, Hector Hammond is an incredibly goofy character to bring to life in live-action anyway, so treating him seriously would be difficult. There’s also the fact that Lanterns has already put Sinestro in a specific place where his story can only get more villainous. As a result, it doesn’t seem like too much of a stretch to wager that Green Lantern stories in the DCU will either be A. Team-focused, like Gardner in Superman, or B. Centered around alien and intergalactic threats. There’s a reason Jordan had a jurisdiction battle with the sheriff in Lanterns‘ first episode, and it was because he assumed it was an alien matter.
To that end, it seems like the future of Green Lanterns in the DCU will be focused on only alien threats, perhaps making characters like The Puppeteer, Major Disaster, Tattooed Man, and even Hector Hammond off the table. That said, Hammond’s origins do deal in alien-adjacent threats, so there’s always hope, but Green Lantern fans are probably hoping to see them face the other Lantern Corps on the big screen rather than just a guy with a big head.
