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Lanterns: Mundy & Lindelof on Sinestro Being a Factor in Hal's Story

Lanterns Showrunner/EP Chris Mundy and EP Damon Lindelof discuss the decision to include Sinestro, his role on Hal Jordan's story, and more.

By the time the credits rolled on the second episode of Chris Mundy, Damon Lindelof, and Tom King's Aaron Pierre (John Stewart) and Kyle Chandler (Hal Jordan)-starring series Lanterns, viewers were left with a whole lot to process – and then, there was that final scene. With the Mannhunters becoming less and less of a secret, Hal suits up and heads off-world for a little one-on-one time with his former mentor and ex-Green Lantern Corps member Sinestro (Ulrich Thomsen). But while Hal's focus is on finding out as much as he knows about the Guardians of the Universe's original police force, Sinestro seems much more interested in discussing Hal's trainee, John. Checking in with Entertainment Weekly, Mundy and Lindelof offered some insights into the decision to include the iconic character, being selective on how Sinestro is utilized during the season, and how the Hal/Sinestro dynamic works nicely in a "The Silence of the Lambs" way.

Lindelof on the Importance of Having Sinestro Be a Factor in Hal's Story: "As big of a trope as it is to go visit Hannibal Lecter in the prison or Loki, this is tried and true. The idea that Sinestro is out there is really, really important to understanding who Hal is. No one is gonna be able to poke at Hal's reluctance to cede the ring more than Sinestro will."

Mundy on Sinestro Being Used in Place of a Defined "Big Bad": "We wanted him in the show just because of his place in the mythology. But by nature of the fact that we were telling a mystery more than we were telling a thriller, we don't really have a big bad in the season. We have mysteries [where] there might be something malevolent behind them or not, and there's a mystery of people's identities or who did what, but it's not 'we're fighting this bad guy, and he's gonna destroy the world.' So in this weird way, it freed us up. We could use him sparingly."

Lindelof: Not Including Sinestro "Feels Wrong": "You start from, 'What if Sinestro isn't in the show at all?' And you just go, 'Well, that feels wrong.' Sometimes you can just let your guide be, 'If I were watching the show and I wasn't working on it, what's the thing that would drive me the most nuts?' and 'What are the things that I expect?' So once we fundamentally understood what the big emotional idea of the show was —which was that Hal was being expected to coach and train John in that kind of 'Training Day' Denzel [Washington]-Ethan Hawke way, but he didn't want to do it and he was being very curmudgeonly about it – it felt like there's a very organic space for the person who trained Hal in this story."

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