Lanterns Episode 1 Ending Explained by Showrunner Chris Mundy

IGN: At what point in the process did you decide to work within multiple timelines to tell the story? In the first episode I think we hit three different time periods.

Chris Mundy: Yeah, pretty much from the jump. We always knew we were going to do two timelines and that there were going to be a couple of different mysteries, literal mysteries that we play, and then also sort of emotional mysteries. I think once we’d done that, we felt that there was a certain freedom to going back in time at other times too. It’s the beauty too of having a show, of playing a teaser before the title card. It gives you a little bit of license to step into something else that’s going to deepen things hopefully. And we used that a few different times over the course of the season.

IGN: Because you’re set in this bigger James Gunn universe, were there ever any times where you had to get approval in terms of the timeline, or did he let you guys just go with it?

Chris Mundy: Initially we asked about that, and he was just starting to shoot Superman. So we were able to read that, which was super helpful. And then there were no real constraints besides that, but obviously everybody at DC, one of our studios, they’re reading [our scripts]. If anything would’ve bumped, that’s an easy phone call or a text. “Oh, that’s bumping up against the plan.” We’re partners in this together.

IGN: Is it annoying having to worry about that stuff at times though?

Chris Mundy: No, it’s just – to be honest – I assumed stepping into a show inside a universe like that, I figured that kind of stuff would be happening all the time. I thought it would happen a ton and it virtually didn’t happen at all. So if anything, it was more I felt the good fortune of having no real restraints.

IGN: I think that’s one of the things that’s interesting about your show. Even though for someone like me, I understand it’s set in the bigger James Gunn universe, but my wife for example probably is going to just enjoy it as an HBO drama and not even think about those things.

Chris Mundy: Exactly. We wanted each of those types of people to have entry to the show. That was super important to us.

IGN: Were there any concerns about making Hal kind of an asshole?

Chris Mundy: Yeah. [laughs] I mean, look, you start a show and there’s concerns about everything because you want it to be good, you want people to like it, but you also want to make sure that you’re doing the most pure version of it you can. So you don’t want to get inside your head too much and edit [or] censor yourself. I think getting Kyle to say yes was a huge weight off our shoulders because Hal could be a bit of an asshole, but Kyle’s just not an asshole. So you could write it up here and he delivers it and it’d be funny, but it still plays down here because he’s so charming. I’d like to say that was something to do with us or our skill, and it’s like 0% us and 100% Kyle.

IGN: Yeah, it’s Coach, right?

Chris Mundy: Exactly. It’s like, “Come on, he’s coaching!”

IGN: Killing off Hal – obviously that’s a big deal. Can you tell me a little bit about your thought process on how you landed on that idea?

Chris Mundy: We needed whatever that mystery was to be as meaningful as possible and as emotional as possible for John, for Hal in a way, but also for the audience. So it felt like [the right thing to do] in a show about someone trying to hold onto this thing, losing it, and then where does he end up and why? And can we do the math to get to that point? How do we use that? Because obviously you don’t take something like that lightly. It’s a huge thing. So is it being done to illuminate not just John, but also illuminate Hal in the best way possible? So the fact that they had confidence or, really, faith in us at least to do it and treat it with the level of care that we hopefully gave it, we felt really lucky. But yeah, it was kind of big and scary just because it’s a choice.

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