‘Lanterns’ Stars Open up About What It Really Means to Raise a Black Superhero

HBO’s ‘Lanterns‘ has quickly established itself as one of the most thoughtfully constructed entries in the DC Universe, built around a detective-style mystery, richly drawn characters, and performances that keep finding new emotional depth with each episode. The first two hours pulled viewers into the chaotic bromance between veteran Green Lantern Hal Jordan and his rookie partner John Stewart, set against the backdrop of small-town Rushville and the alien threat hiding within it.

Episode three, titled “OutKast,” takes a deliberate step back from that mystery to slow down and dig into where John Stewart actually came from. The timing of that pause turns out to be exactly right, giving the show room to explore some of its richest material yet through the story of John’s parents, John Stewart Sr. and Bernadette.

That backstory centers on how John Sr. missed his own opportunity to become a Green Lantern, and the show uses that failure to explore a theme many Black Americans have lived with for generations. J. Alphonse Nicholson, who plays John Stewart Sr., and Jasmine Cephas Jones, who plays Bernadette, spoke about bringing groundedness and realism to that story in a new interview with The Nerds of Color tied to the episode’s release.

The core question the episode wrestles with is a brutal one. After someone has already lived through a genuinely terrifying situation, how are they supposed to move through the world when fear has shaped their entire experience in a way it hasn’t for people who never had to face that same threat?

That question becomes the emotional engine for everything that follows once John Sr. and Bernadette realize their infant son could be groomed to eventually earn the ring himself, following Bernadette’s own encounter with a Guardian. From there, the episode opens up young John’s world to tough love, difficult choices, harsh training, and hard realizations he has to work through in order to grow into the man and superhero-in-training audiences see in the present-day timeline.

Nicholson and Jones spoke specifically about the dualities involved in raising a son to become a superhero in a world where Black boys and men are so often expected to be seen as anything but heroic. That tension sits at the heart of what makes “OutKast” land as more than just an origin story detour, turning John’s path to the ring into something inseparable from the realities his parents were actually navigating.

The performances anchoring that material have drawn particular praise since the episode aired. Much of the credit for shaping that emotional core goes to credited screenwriter Vanessa Baden Kelly, whose script threads John’s unconventional childhood, a harrowing Marine Corps deployment, and an unexpected detour into art school into a single throughline that builds toward the moment he finally earns his ring.

‘Lanterns’ has continued distinguishing itself from other recent DC Universe entries by leaning into that kind of grounded, character-first storytelling rather than treating its superhero elements as the whole point. The choice to dedicate an entire hour to John Sr. and Bernadette’s story, rather than simply gesturing at it in flashback fragments, gives Nicholson and Jones the space to build a fully realized couple whose choices carry real emotional weight.

With the first three episodes of ‘Lanterns’ now streaming on HBO Max, the show has set a considerably higher bar for itself heading into the rest of the season. Nicholson and Jones’ comments make clear just how deliberately the cast and creative team approached the responsibility of telling this particular story.

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