Kyle Chandler As Green Lantern Is Some Damn Good Casting

By Mike Redmond | TV | September 24, 2024 |

By Mike Redmond | TV | September 24, 2024 |

I’m gonna make a confession here: I have never watched Friday Night Lights. I saw the movie, which was depressing as hell, but never pulled the trigger on the show because I’m just not a football guy. That said, Kyle Chandler has been a dude who’s been on my radar for easily two decades now. He has a knack for showing up in some bit role where he’s almost always immediately killed — The Kingdom is when I started really clocking him — but not before leaving you with the impression of, wow, there’s a real man’s man. And that’s a phrase I loathe to use as we’re presently drowning in a sea of alpha male wannabes whose brains are so rotted from raw milk and supplements to comprehend that the entire concept of an alpha was horsesh*t.

Anyway, my point is Chandler looks like a dude straight out of the Golden Age. He has that classic movie star look that doesn’t exist anywhere outside of Jon Hamm. Plunk Kyle Chandler down in a 1950s diner, and I’d buy it. That’s not to pine for the problematic days of yesteryear. I’m just trying to establish that if someone said Chandler is an Alex Ross painting come to life, I would believe it. (Before Jon Bernthal landed the role, Chandler was my fan casting for The Punisher. He just has that old school look.)

So with that in mind, Deadline grabbed my attention when it reported that Chandler is circling the role of Hal Jordan for Damon Lindelof’s Lanterns after Josh Brolin bounced. And I gotta say, we’re winning with this choice:

The series from Ozark’s Chris Mundy, Watchmen’s Damon Lindelof and comic book writer Tom King follows new recruit John Stewart and Lantern legend Jordan, two intergalactic cops drawn into a dark, Earth-based mystery as they investigate a murder in the American heartland.

The search for an actor to play Stewart is ongoing.

We’ve already seen Lindelof absolutely crush a DC adaptation with Watchmen, so that’s more than enough to be fully intrigued by this show. The involvement of Tom King, however, is next level. There’s a reason James Gunn is heavily pulling from the comics writer’s work for his burgeoning DCU, and it’s because King freaking rocks. He has an incredible talent for portraying DC heroes as both god-like and horribly flawed figures with a hard-boiled vibe delivered by killer artists like Mitch Gerads and Greg Smallwood.

If you want a taste of what Lanterns and Gunn’s DCU will deliver — or just a freaking solid graphic novel read that doesn’t require any sort of comics knowledge to enjoy — here are a few titles to scope out: Mister Miracle, Strange Adventures, The Human Target, and The Omega Men.

But back on point, Kyle Chandler is freaking perfect for whatever Lindelof and King are cooking here. I can’t think of a better actor to play a grizzled, no-nonsense Hal Jordan. He has that 50s matinee star look that’s straight out of a King story, and hopefully, he doesn’t die in the first episode. — Aw, dammit, that’s what’s happening, isn’t it? Sonofa…