Lanterns recap: Nathan Fillion finally reenters the story in Season 1, Episode 6, and Guy Gardner comes back as the new Green Lantern. The episode is now streaming on HBO Max, and it resets the lineup after John Stewart leaves behind the ring for good.
Fillion said he had trouble convincing friends he was even in the show after missing the first five episodes. He framed Guy as the kind of Lantern who cares as much about being seen as about the power itself, which fits a character who is now carrying the ring while the story shifts around him.
Nathan Fillion and the ring
Fillion called Guy “beholden” to someone for the first time in his life, and said that wearing the ring matters more to Guy’s ego than it does to Hal Jordan and John Stewart. He also said Guy does not like owing John Stewart anything, which makes the handoff feel less like a promotion and more like a debt being settled on screen.
“He’s a very public part. I think that says a lot about who he is,” Fillion said. He added that Guy is “very concerned about brand and corporate sponsorship,” with financial goals, plans to open a bar, and a desire to be not just Green Lantern, but a famous Green Lantern.
John Stewart in jail
In Season 1, Episode 6, Guy visits John in jail after getting a distress signal from Rushville. John cuts through the handoff with a blunt line: “Everything you have is because I didn’t take it.” That exchange is the episode’s cleanest explanation for why the ring changes hands and why Guy arrives carrying more ego than gratitude.
Fillion said Guy was picked as the third-best Green Lantern option on Earth after Hal Jordan and John Stewart, and that he is the only guy in the room with the ring. That status fits a character who throws his weight around, but it also exposes how much of his identity depends on being the one left standing.
Rushville to Green Lantern
The 2026 timeline widens the frame: John returns to Rushville, meets up with Hal one last time, and then Hal is found dead in the bleachers. The episode uses that sequence to push Guy from absence into authority, with the ring transfer landing as a structural change rather than a cameo beat.
Fillion said his main concern was consistency, even with the tonal shift, and likened the role to spending a weekend in Metropolis or Gotham — the same person, different weekend. That is the right read on this episode: Guy’s public, corporate-minded image sits uneasily inside a story that wants him grounded, and the discomfort is the point. If John is out, Guy is in, and the show has clearly chosen its new Green Lantern for the road ahead.
