Lanterns secretly gave Aaron Pierre's John Stewart a Green Lantern ring in the HBO series that was different from Hal Jordan's in design, and now, fans have the best look at it yet. Following Supergirl's disappointing run at the box office, a lot of DCU fans hit the panic button for the franchise. However, James Gunn's new universe is righting the ship with the release of Lanterns, which serves as a murder mystery while fleshing out the characters of John Stewart and Hal Jordan.
Following the release of Lanterns Episode 3 (titled "OutKast"), a fan made an interesting discovery regarding John Stewart's Green Lantern ring. As shared via Instagram, the fan stated that they believed John's official Lantern ring had a different design than Hal Jordan's. Specifically, this came after Episode 3 revealed a Lantern ring when John was tasked to construct his father's watch. According to the fan, John's ring differed from Hal's in having a black band, silver trim, and a few minor alterations.
Notably, the fan included a recreation of the two rings, showing them side by side. The ring on the left was meant to be a recreation of John's ring, with the one on the right being Hal's, as it had the gold trim.
For the most part, the two rings look the same in the recreation, but the trim color distinguishes them.
While this originated as speculation and was not confirmed by DC Studios, Lanterns prop master Jeffrey Johnson left a comment on the fan's post, confirming that their suspicions were correct and that John's ring was, in fact, different. Johnson stated, "Indeed he did," referring to the fan speculating that John received a different ring.
When taking a closer look at the ring presented to John in Episode 3, it is clear that it matches many of the details in the fan recreation. For example, it has the silver trim.
Another angle of the ring from that episode offers the best view of its face, showcasing the silver trim once again and a small black circle at the center.
While the fan's recreation did not include this small black circle in the center, placing John's ring directly beside Hal's official ring from the series makes it clear that the two are entirely different. Hal's ring does not have that smaller black circle in the center. Instead, it just has one larger green circle, whereas John's has a black circle surrounded by a green ring, which is then surrounded by another ring before reaching the silver trim.
The fan's recreation of John's ring is quite accurate, though, and looks almost identical to the real thing. Most likely, if John's ring were shown up close in better detail, it would look extremely similar to that recreation.
As mentioned, there are only a couple of minor differences. But once Lanterns is over, fans will likely be given an official look at John's ring, especially if DC Studios releases an art book or a behind-the-scenes special on HBO Max for the show.
Why Are the Green Lantern Rings Different?
It has now been confirmed that John Stewart and Hal Jordan have different Lantern rings. While that is somewhat of a major revelation, it is even more important to note that Nathan Fillion's Guy Gardner also has a differently designed ring. In fact, his ring looks much more distinct than Hal's or John's.
So, in the DCU, it seems as though each member of the Lanterns is given a different ring. It is unclear whether this is simply a style choice for the franchise or something with deeper meaning.
Most likely, an official explanation will come around, because designing different rings for each character would only mean more work for the props department and potentially higher costs.
It is possible that each ring is different so that its user can be easily identified, especially if a Lantern were to be separated from their ring. However, it is also possible that the rings could hold a symbolic meaning. For example, the darker nature of John's ring could represent his difficult upbringing and everything he went through as a child.
On the flip side, Guy's ring could be brighter to match his more comedic personality. And the gold on Hal's may indicate that he could become Parallax at some point in the series, or in the DCU.
Whatever the case may be, the important thing is that the rings are different, which was likely an intentional decision to serve the overarching story of the DCU.
