Green Lantern has been a significant figure in the DC universe as of late, even though no one has played the character in any significant way for live action in many years. The Lantern Corps has made news because Zack Snyder wanted to showcase a Lantern in his Snyder Cut of Justice League, available now on HBO Max. But WarnerMedia asked Snyder not to, because they had plans for Green Lantern. And now, with the casting of Finn Wittrock as Guy Gardner, those plans are starting to see the light of day.
The Green Lantern’s light of the day, you might say.
Most of the time, when Green Lantern has appeared in a mainstream property (notably the Ryan Reynolds movie that Warner Bros. released in 2011), the project has focused on hot-shot test pilot Hal Jordan. But DC Comics fans know that the Green Lantern Corps., essentially an intergalactic police force that assigns different Lanterns to specific sections of the universe, is populated with all sorts of wild and creative characters, so it’s exciting that Variety reports that Finn Wittrock has been cast as Guy Gardner in the upcoming HBO Max television series.
The Green Lantern series will be a 10-episode run, and will mark the first foray into an ongoing experiment that DC Films will be launching with HBO Max. The plan, according to the studio, is to create a synergy between the theatrical DC adventures and the properties that make their way to the HBO Max streaming platform. Case in point, James Gunn’s upcoming movie The Suicide Squad already has spun off an HBO Max series Peacemaker, centered on Jon Cena’s character. These types of collaborations will try to be the norm at WarnerMedia moving forward.
Finn Wittrock is best known for the roles he has played on Ryan Murphy’s American Horror Story and American Crime Story, which earned him Emmy nominations. while he also appeared alongside AHS colleague Sarah Paulson for the One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest riff, Ratched. He recently tried the leap to leading man in the quirky rom-com Long Weekend, where he had incredible chemistry with co-star Zoe Chao. But this appears to be the step into superhero storytelling that many young actors like Wittrock seek to take these days.
The plot for this Green Lantern series sounds fascinating. Per Variety, it will span decades, tracing its story all the way back to 1941 with the introduction of Alan Scott, then following multiple Lanterns including Gardner and the half-alien hybrid Bree Jarta. This has to be exciting news for DC fans who have followed the exploits of the full Green Lantern Corps, and who have dreamed of seeing some offbeat characters on screen in an official Green Lantern project. With the hiring of Finn Wittrock, expect more casting announcements and news as the HBO Max series goes into production.
