While all movies and television series based on comics come with some concerns, HBO’s Lanterns in particular was met with significant trepidation. Almost from the very start of the marketing for the series, there’s been controversy over the series, with fans questioning the use of green or lack thereof, concerns about the series’ tone, and plenty of questions about exactly how the series would translate the iconic space cops for live-action and give them their appropriate powers, too. While later <a href="https://comicvibe.com/watch-new-trailer-for-netflixs-a-different-world/” title=”Watch new trailer for Netflix's 'A Different World'”>trailers and teasers helped to assuage some fears, there were still concerns headed into Sunday night’s premiere and a new report suggests that, now that Lanterns is in brightest day, those concerns never really stood a chance.
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A new poll on the official ComicBook X account asked fans what they thought of the first episode of Lanterns following its premiere on Sunday offering respondents a range of responses: Loved It, Liked It, It’s Fine, Did Not Like It. At the time of this article’s writing, more than 78% of people marked that they either “liked” or “loved” the series premiere. Nearly 50% overall fell into the “loved it” category, suggesting that the fears fans had heading into the series have been successfully squashed.
Now that #Lanterns has premiered, what’d you think of the first episode?
— ComicBook.com (@ComicBook) August 17, 2026
Lanterns Is Off to a Strong Start (And a Major Mystery)
Given that there were a lot of concerns about Lanterns before it debuted, it’s pretty exciting to see the show turning out to be solid. Things started off strong even before the series’ Sunday premiere with an impressive 94% on Rotten Tomatoes, but it isn’t just the critics with praise for the series. Audiences have thus far given the series an 87%. That’s a pretty big deal and makes it the DCU’s first hit for 2026 after a disappointing outing for Supergirl earlier this year. The critics score also puts it right on par with Peacemaker Season 2.
And when you dig into those reviews, there are a few things that consistently get praise. The series has gotten its props for the way it executes its story and how it approaches the Green Lantern mythos, and that’s something that comes into play in the very first episode. The series premiere hit viewers not only the establishment of John Stewart (Aaron Pierre) and Hal Jordan’s (Kyle Chandler) relationship but also hits audiences with a shocking death that serves as the core mystery we expect to see unfold over the rest of the season (we won’t spoil that for you here, but you can read more about it and what it could mean here if you’d like.)
It’s the grounded nature of the story and a stunning mystery that goes a long way to give Lanterns a feel that is unlike any other superhero series we’ve seen. And if the responses to our poll are any indication, that means the series may just be winning over some skeptics now that we can finally see for ourselves exactly what all the teases were leading up to. More than that, it will be very interesting to see where ethe series goes from here and if it can win over that remaining 20% of audiences. After all, we have seven more episodes to go.
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