‘Lanterns’ Season Finale Breakdown With Tom King

Hello and welcome to a very special, an interview special. That's right. For House of R. We're doing a very special thing for this Lanterns finale. We have the man, the myth, the legend himself, Tom King, here on the show to talk about the Lanterns finale. Mallory Rubin, anything you want to say about that? Not only is Tom King the co-creator, one of the co-creators, along with Damon Lindelof and Chris Mundy of Lanterns and an executive producer of Lanterns, he is one of the great comic book writers and creators in recent memory. So it was really a treat to talk to Tom about this finale and about the season of TV. But also just a balance story about apples, about Billy's dip, about football, Star Trek, and about being a nerd who loves this stuff. We really had a blast. It was such a treat to get to break this all down with Tom. This is a full spoilers, all spoilers, all the time discussion. From minute one. So for the Lanterns finale, if you have not watched that yet, go watch that and come back and listen to our conversation with Tom King. And then mere hours after that, come back to the House of R feed, the Ringerverse YouTube channel. Because our deep dive on the season finale will be waiting for you first thing Monday morning. You know the drill from there. Watch, follow, hang out with us, send us your emails, do it all. Excellent. So we're going to get to our conversation with Tom King right after this. Low energy, unfocused, foggy. You might be dehydrated. Whether it's hot yoga, over 100 degree weather, or too much sun, Gatorlite with a specialized blend of five electrolytes. This was scientifically designed to help move fluids into the body faster for rapid rehydration. Shop now at retailers nationwide. Gatorlite, hydrates faster than water. Is it in you? Symptoms noted are signs of mild to moderate dehydration. Consult a healthcare professional if symptoms persist. I want to start, I've actually, this is a cheat. I've actually heard you talk about this elsewhere, but I found it so fascinating that I'm going to ask it myself just in case our podcast listeners haven't heard it. I feel like it's a test. And if I say a different answer. If I say a different answer than before, I'll have screwed it up. Yeah, exactly. No, this is so much a story about personal evolution. It's permitted. You're fine. Oh, great, great. Exactly. Personal evolution. Perfect. Yeah, that's the answer to it all. I wanted our listeners to hear you talk about a murder mystery as sort of like a storytelling cheat or hack for introducing a new world for readers or viewers. Yeah, absolutely. But before I say this off the air, I just want to say on the air, what a huge fan I am of yours. How much I love listening to you guys. How, what big, am I allowed to swear? Probably not. Yes, you are. Am I allowed to swear? Oh. Yes. What big fucking nerds you are. How, um, how, how it just feels like I'm listening to my friends talk. Oh, that's awesome. Thank you for doing what you do and promoting what you promote. I have not listened to any of your Lanterns episodes because it would drive me insane. But besides that, it's wonderful. Um. Thank you, Tom. Thank you. So nice. To, to, to, uh, answer, answer the question. Yeah. I mean, that's, it's, is it the oldest trick in the book? No, because like, um, the oldest trick in the book is, is Homer being like, no, you can't find your wife and you're looking for her. That's like the oldest trick, right? So this has got to be like the second oldest trick in the book, um, is, is the murder mystery. And a lot of people, when they're building a story and by a lot, I mean, I mean, it's got like 40% of stories. Like it's a ridiculous amount of stories. Are you think of an incredible world that you want to explore, um, as a writer, um, and that can be anything. From another planet to a cruise ship, um, to a place in the past. And you're like, how the hell do I explore this place? Like what, what does my character do to explore? I know someone gets murdered and I have a detective investigate that and he can go through that. And so that's why, how we get, you know, things like Watchmen, a very famous comic is just the murder mystery comic. Um, and how we get things like, you know, Chinatown exploring this sort of LA thing. Um, but it, it extends, you know, beyond noir to almost every genre you can have. It's just, it's. It's almost a cop out that it's so easy and cliche, but it's, it's not, it's just, it's, um, you know, it's, uh, you know, it's, it's Monet drawing, um, the same, uh, chapel again and again, and again, like, like it's, it's, it's how, it's how writers do their work by doing the same thing someone else done, but putting your own vision on it. Well, I'm curious, I'm curious then in terms of crafting a murder mystery at the center of a story, how important to you, especially like in the context of television, how do you, how important to you is something like surprise in a finale and a revelation for, for who done it? Like it, are you looking for jaws to drop or do you want to like lay a breadcrumb trail? Uh, that's sort of thick enough that we all felt like we followed it together. I really should not be honest about this, but, um, so I apologize. Yeah, I think you should as a, as a fan, right. As a guy who was, it was very much a fan boy who didn't start writing comics until I was 34. Um, so you gotta imagine I met many years of, of consuming before I became someone who created, um, you, you care from the outside so much about the plot, um, so much about the murder mystery. Once you start to create it, you care less about the plot and more about the characters. Um, who does the murder? That's, that's very interesting. She's sort of the first day you get it and you're like, okay, I got this murder scene and not every writer is the same. I should say that like different people think differently, but, but, um, at least for me, like, okay, that's the plot, but what matters to me is the execution is the actual words. It's exploring these characters as they go along the way, because a very boring murder mystery is just a very boring murder mystery. What makes it stimulate makes it interesting is that you're super invested in the characters that you're actually exploring something, but you're actually saying something. And so it's, it's so like, cause cause the audience, you forget that part because to you like that, that's become such a 1% of what you're working. You're working the other 99%, but the audience that's 80%. Um, and, and, and so it's like a reversal. You sort of crossed the line and like, oh, who did it? You're like, oh, no, what do you care? Who did it? Did you see the incredible suit? John Warren, what that said about his character? You're like, um, so yeah, it is, it's, it's a bizarre thing when you sort of cross the path from creator, um, from observer into, um, observed, uh, we, despite all of those beautiful and poetic things you just said about how it's, it's less about the plot and more about the heart of the thing. We do actually still want to ask you about the carry of it all because you know, we are, uh, I, so I, I just chatted with, you know, you and, and Chris and Damon and, and Kyle and Aaron. Um, and so I heard Chris's answer to this question, which is basically like, did you ever consider anyone other than Carrie was a carry from day one or were other contenders in the mix? And, you know, it's, it's sounded like the answer was pretty early on. It was, it was going to be Carrie, but I'm curious for you. Cause we on, on house of art, we've been speculating freely, you know, we always, Joe always says like, hold, hold a theory loosely, but also we like to go to theory corner and, you know, Carrie was a suspect of ours for sure. We considered Noah considered Billy. We considered Liana, we considered the idea that it had been, you know, Hal, um, given how the season developed, was it always Carrie for you? Did that always feel like the right choice? Why did it feel like the right choice and how does what happened with, with Carrie and the reveal on the finale, um, you know, feel like it connects to the overall season long examination for, for Hal certainly of, of opening up, right. Of forming these real relationships because that's a, that's a tough thing on brutal beat, uh, for, for Carrie to be the one to, uh, to put the bullet in house head pain. I mean, when something goes from zero to something like this wasn't based on any previous property, it was just, um, first just me in a room and then three dudes in a room and then six writers in a bigger room, sort of these sort of different phases. Um, and so like every possibility. Was considered, uh, we knew it was going to be generally thought it'd be a murder mystery for those reasons I said before. So we like, who's going to get murdered was like the first, like what, what's, who's the, like, like, and we definitely all threw out candidates. So we told her Dame and I landed on how, um, and I including Carrie, uh, and then once we had a, we had a murder victim before we had a murderer for sure. And then we were sort of going through like this world we had built and like who would this and this and this and this. Um, but yeah, we got to carry pretty early on. I think I talked about this in the, in the bigger press conference, so forgive me for, but one of the big things was, um, undermining cliches and, and when we were undermining cliches, this whole thing is it's, it's a superhero show, but it's not bombastic. It's, it's, it's two doing true detective that undermines the sort of superhero cliche, but there's also the fact that we're doing a detective show cliche in a small town. And that's like a second set of cliches that comes in, which is more relevant. Um, probably to Christian Damon who have written those kinds of show before, um, as opposed to me. But one of the things that's a cliche in all those shows is the small town, female sheriff, usually a single mom, sometimes not, um, basically all modeled after the, um, you know, the, the, the platonic ideal of the Fargo sheriff, right? Like, um, and so the idea, and then she's helpful and she falls in love with your lead, but she's actually tougher than you think she is. There's all sorts of cliches beyond that. And so one of the, the ideas was like, how do we make that character deeper, um, how to, and, and, and, and, and the idea that she would be. The murderer, um, that, that character that usually is the helpful kind of person who solves the murder and it's the love interest. is actually at the center of this conspiracy and is causing the conspiracy rather than reacting to the conspiracy was very appealing to us in sort of our calling card of resist the normal and get the surprise. - Can we stay on the death for a minute here? Because I want to talk about the person on the other end of that bullet for another minute here, Hal. You have spoken about and shared how Hal is your favorite character, but also how in an effort to deliver on this promise for "Lanterns" to be a show that felt like it was really about real life and rooted and grounded in real life, that grief and loss had to be centered in the story, right? What is it like, I'm wondering, 'cause you've shared your own feelings about that, what has it been like for you to watch other people now go through their version of that with Hal, with mourning Hal? You know, both the people who've loved him for ages, who've been attached to him from prior stories and had a relationship to him, and also people who, this is their first experience with Hal. They discovered Hal here. They fell in love with him for the first time after meeting him in the show, and they have the shock of the death at the end of the premiere, but then also this second wave of mourning him anew when the hologram flickers out. What has that been like for you to see other people form this attachment and grieve a character who has meant so much to you as a fan and a creator alike? - I mean, there's quite a few sides of it. First of all, it's just, I've never related to an audience more. Like, trust me, like when we were at the table read for the first time and Kyle was reading, you know, Harry Potter went to Hogwarts, you ignorant alien, fuck, which I very much remember and being, and I remember just like, you know, Chris Damon, so I was like, how are we gonna bring him back to life? Like, Kyle is so good. Like, we cannot have this end. And, and you just, you fell in love with him for the first time. And yeah, I've written him briefly in the comics. And then I wrote a comic that was like a parody of a terrible world where Hal like puts his ring to him, blows his head off. And that was to show how awful the world was. That it was so bad that this could happen to Hal Jordan. I'm gonna say Kyle and Hal, they're gonna flip in my head a thousand times. And I apologize. I'm sure John and Aaron will do the same. But, so another level of this is just convincing people that I don't hate Hal, that I love this character, and I just think he is so fantastic. One of my deep nerds is Star Trek. I'm a Star Trek nerd. And to me, Hal Jordan is Captain Kirk. Like he's that, I don't believe in a no win scenario. I just, that was like my hero growing up. The idea like, why does God need a starship? Like he's the guy who just, he has no fear, but he's always willing to take that next step. I love him. And so I utterly sympathize, but I think that's just, you know, we're, we're living in a time of this sort of, this superhero fatigue where people can look at superhero content and say, oh, this means nothing. It's noise. It's just the same thing I've seen a thousand times. And so one of the ways to cut through that noise is to do what writers terribly, the one no writers hate to get from every other writer, which is kill your darlings. And to be like, look, we love them as much as you love them. And that's the stakes we're willing to do to tell you this universe is big and this universe is real, this universe matters. - Can I ask you, I still love Star Trek. If, if. - Right. - If, if Hal is Kirk, is there a temptation then to put some Spock in, in John? Like that sort of logical, cooler demeanor inside of him. - Oh man, it carries bones. It's fine. Yeah. You just, you're seeing through the matrix now. You are a hundred percent seeing. - It's all there. I love it. - The first writing lesson I ever got, I worked for Chris Claremont, who's. - Yeah. - If you love X-Men, he just basically did X-Men. I mean, it's more complicated than that, but if you love that sort of thing. I was his assistant when I was like 18 years old. And the first thing he ever told me about writing that really penetrated my mind is like, Kirk is the best character to write in fiction. I was like, why is he best? He's like, 'cause his brain is outside his body. Like as a writer, when he has a logical thought, that's Scott, when he has Spock. That's when he has an emotional thought, that's bones. And so you can have sort of his id and his superego argue with each other while you're writing. I never thought of, I was like characters being separate things. And the idea that all three of those were pointing in the same direction. In this show, yeah, there's definitely that dynamic that I learned from Chris when I was 18. - This is like that Golden Trio episode we did, Mallory. - It is. - Yeah, exactly, love it. - Just thinking of that. - Can I follow? Okay, so this show, this relationship between John and Hal or the Hal Graham, if you prefer to delineate it that way, ends with an exchange of I love you, which is just my favorite thing that has happened. - Amazing, just amazing. - I love love stories, however they manifest. And you know, this series, as we were covering it, we were talking about the show "Hacks." Like we were talking about these like sort of mentor-mentee love stories that are platonic, but it's about learning to love this other person and also learning to love yourself in the process. So can you talk about this idea of this, you know, there's the Carrie-Hal love story, which we are both very invested in, but there's the John and Hal love story. Can you talk about that as a foundation of this show? - I also love love stories. I write them too much. I love my work. - No such thing. - No such thing. - No such thing. - No such thing. - I'm writing my first romance now with Superman. - Thrilling. - Oh my God, guys, it's so good. - Oh my God. - Oh my God. - Wow. - But not just because I was inspired by your talk of all the things, but partly because I appreciate that. But yes, when we first talk about a buddy comedy, in the beginning, Damon echoing, you know, learning something when I was 18, and learning something when I'm as old as like 30 years later, immediately was like, "I've written buddy cops before, and buddy cops are just romantic comedies by other names." He's like that, and I was like, "Oh my God, he's 100% right." Like, you do the meet cute, you do the build, you do the breakup, you do the get back together. It's the same thing, except, you know, you say bro instead of honey. - Or buttercup. - Or buttercup, yes. - Or junior. - Or Jax. - Yeah, and I watched the, in prep for this, I watched, I hadn't watched the finale in months, and much to my kids' dismay, because we're watching it live, they haven't seen it at all. I was watching it at the breakfast table this morning, like, "Shut up, I don't wanna hear it." - Oh, man. - And yeah, when we came to that, I did not, I think Chris wrote that last scene, so I'm not complimenting myself. But yeah, it got me choked up with the "I Love You Too," those two, 'cause it feels like, even though they've only been eight episodes, and even though if you actually track it, they weren't together that long, it feels like they've been through something. And the great romances that make me cry is when people have kind of gone on a journey together, and it's been up and down, and at the end, you're like, "But we're still here, you know, "we matter to each other like that." And I felt all of that. I mean, and it's so much in Kyle's and Aaron's performance. I mean, Kyle's got that sort of Harrison Ford smile, and Aaron has just, he stands like a superhero among men, so that helps. - Let's stick with the emotional heft that we feel between so many of these characters, because this season engages with and grapples with some very difficult subject matter. You know, we have Martin Jordan's suicide, the idea of the Jordan boy's legacy, it's in your blood. And we have John telling Noah that, you know, Zoe wanted him to kill her, and then Noah asking John to kill him. We have Carrie worrying about whether Noah has her, you know, quote, "shitty genes." We have John, of course, confronting, you know, across the season, what his parents did, the choices that they made for him. You know, the idea of whether we can escape our nature and the ways that we can come to fear what is lurking inside of us. You know, I was just so struck by that Noah line in the finale. If you could see the inside of my head, you'd never stop screaming. Like, I'll be thinking about that forever. - Same. - But there's, just, what a bar. - That's a Damon Lindelof fastball, but I never wrote that. - That's like The Miz coming in with 105 there with the heat, just unbelievable. But there's also just such an empowering and hopeful emphasis, right, entwined with all of this. There's Hal telling John that Martin couldn't bear to let him see him, and then we watch Hal, in his second chances, find a way to do that, to open up, to build new bonds. To let other people see him, to share. We hear John say that Noah's actions aren't programming, that they're love. Obviously, Hal and John, you know, in addition to the "I love you," Hal tells John, "Don't be afraid to be afraid." So the show interrogates what people do to each other, but also then champions connection with each other as a path to healing and growth and betterment. How did, did both of those missions feel equally important and ultimately inextricable? Because there is a like less deft and well-executed story where they, where it feels like dissonance. Like those things are in conflict with each other, but here they just ultimately like heightened each other. - Yeah, I mean, that's absolutely a wonderful compliment. And thank you for seeing all that stuff that we worked so hard on and hoped would be in the final product. I mean, I think that's what makes John unique is his ability to kind of see that, 'cause what you said, Damon we all have kids that are about like in their teenagers and are sort of about to leave and I think I think I think a lot of this is sort of built on the fear of are they gonna if you're a writer you're full of anxiety and emotion and insanity like that's what it means that's why you do this for a living instead of you know be a lawyer or a doctor like a normal person or a podcaster right like that's oh yeah that's normal we're normal yeah um and so of course we all sort of share the anxiety of like how have we given this to our kids and how and how and have we not but but the idea at the end that John's trauma I've written about this this a lot um is a horrible thing and it's horrible it happens it's horrible all of us can go through it but it also becomes part of you it also becomes part of your strength it's not just something that you need to be scared of it's something that you can also eventually be proud of your scars become your armor become your ability to fight right um and the fact that John went through this childhood where he was sort of put through such hell um and had to come to grips with that and rebel against it and go back means that he can see people uh in three dimensions you know he can see Noah he can see Noah's struggle uh um the way I don't think even Hal would see it he can see Carrie's struggle I don't think the way Carrie would see her own struggle um and and and and get the sense that that like you see that moment with Bernard he's he's like yeah my mother was horrible to me but she was also wonderful and I think that's a really good way to put it I think that's a really good way to put it I think that's a really good way to put it I think that's a really good way to put it like like um my my my father was scared as anything but he was also brave and I can see both sides of that um and and that's what makes him evolve it's making him the ability to to have the bird without the ring it's it's that sort of next step beyond sort of one dimension to three dimensions and I and then that's why he's at the hero at the end that's I feel the story of the finale looking back on it um and I think you especially get that with Kelly's performance just being struck by it again this this morning where I think in a way that's a really good way to normal drama you draw just a direct line between um what Sheriff Kerry does in terms of she kills him and then she calls Hal and and like you'd be like I I killed him and then I had a plan to hide my murder like you'd Columbo I love Columbo you'd be like there's my whole plan to get away but her plan doesn't make sense I remember in the writer's room that kind of bothering us like why did she call John she's gonna get discovered but then she hides it from John to not get discovered and it goes back and forth and I we were I was very bothered by this just as a storyteller because it wasn't a linear line it wasn't Columbo um but when I see it now it just feels so much more human and so much more like she's making mistakes and regretting them in real time yeah um and and and she's not she's not in control of her emotions who would be in that circumstance who would do the right thing exactly correct um and and she doesn't she doesn't know herself even entirely and to me it reads as more human I think that's what John sees yeah I also felt that it just it felt like Kerry's maybe a more um shielded and like private version but Kerry's version of penance you know which is obviously so much a part of of of uh the arc for for Hal and others yeah we've much discussed like the you know I'm a big film noir fan and it used to be because there used to be a film noir in the 50s there was a code and like if you committed a murder you had to go to jail by the end that was the law like the FCC would get to get involved we don't have that anymore but it it's still like kind of ingrained in the DNA of our watching they're like oh someone committed a crime they have to be punished there must be and so we had a big debate it was like does Kerry get punished like nothing could punish her more yeah than the fact that she did that thing and she has to live with it there's no jail isn't worse than that like she like that she she um and that so that was a big part of thinking of sort of Kerry's and how she ends up in the end it's funny because um I'm a huge Kelly MacDonald fan from everything she's done but most of all my most rewatched my one of my most beloved movies of all time is Gosford Park and spoilers for Gosford Park but this is a Gosford Park ending what what purpose could it possibly serve and I just like I got really excited by that um and I I think it's a brilliant ending um I want to circle back to uh you know you mentioned um the goat Bernadette um mixed I'm mixed on her parenting but I'm writing I'm writing Mr. Miracle and the one that has a villain called Bernadette so since I got her name slightly wrong yes um last last year Variety announced a different actress to play sort of like an older version of Bernadette and and so I'm curious if there was ever and you know here in the finale we get Jasmine Cephas Jones who's in sort of older age makeup here in the finale and I'm curious if there was ever a different I don't know split between 2016-2026 a different balance of the Stewart family story inside of the larger story uh that you decided to recalibrate or what was the decision there I mean Chris can talk to it better than I can but it was nothing more than logistic stuff of could could we could look like they're in their 60s like it was like it was nothing more than would the makeup look silly and could we pull it off and I think at some point we're like no we can do this so we're gonna sleep with one actor so it was nothing more than the practicality of how how makeup goes on a face um it was it wasn't a story issue at all low energy unfocused foggy you might be dehydrated Gatorade zero powders have been scientifically designed to help improve hydration balance in the body with a clinically proven electrolyte blend and no artificial colors or flavors great tasting hydration no matter where you're going shop now online or at retailers nationwide Gatorade hydrates better than water is it in you symptoms noted are signs of mild to moderate dehydration consult a health care professional if symptoms persist that that very different subject matter but talking about like how will things look on the screen makes makes me think of another question I wanted to ask you uh there's been you know rightly such an emphasis across the season um about how grounded how grounded lanterns is and that is obviously true uh but the show also manages this is something that Joe and I have have really appreciated and talked about in our coverage this season never seems to feel embarrassed of its cosmic and and comic book elements and and roots you know you can think of the constructs or uh finally seeing uh Anton's planet or everything with Sinestro or obviously most importantly of all our guy Earl um we're we're in the middle of a pandemic and we're in the middle of a pandemic and we're in the middle of a pandemic and we're in the middle of a pandemic and we're in the middle of a pandemic are you the keeper of those keys as someone so steeped in in comic book creation and and also celebration and and just more generally like how did you and the team approach uh ensuring that lanterns would honor both its dusty true detective mission and and the larger green lanterns ties and and universe that it is a part of I mean I think there's a spectrum in in in the room with the Chris Chris money who's the showrunner who readily admits he has no nerd access I don't think he's seen endgame like I don't like I don't he's like what about what about endgame encore uh-huh yeah that's yeah maybe he went this weekend um uh no I mean like like like Chris like plays tennis and basketball he's like I don't I don't even know how to relate to that shit I'm I'm on the floor reading um uh to you know some of the writers who are in the middle you know uh Brie and and Justin and Vanessa and then to Damon who's who's deeply nerdy um and and and knows the stuff very well and grew up reading comics and then to me who's just like a meshed a meshed in the stuff um and so but I mean yeah I think one of my I didn't say roles in the room because you know sometimes the roles get reversed um but but it goes from both polarities with me one of my roles was to be like this isn't a detective show this is a superhero detective show and to constantly remind people that our audience is that none of us got in this room because we want to write true detective season five um we want to write lanterns yeah and just and sort of stick up for that and to say don't be proud but um yeah but the other side of that equation was the pull from the other side which is um a lot of and I've seen this over and over over again um having worked both both sides Hollywood and comics is that when Hollywood touches comics they tend to think comics are um I don't know the right word is but dumb is one of them like like uh they tend to look down on comics and think oh I I'm working with this meeting of superheroes therefore I can make this I can it's not lazy but it's like I can lean into the boring the cliches the like the the capes will get me as far as I need to go and I've seen like incredible creators who would treat regular people with nuance and beauty get to a superhero and they're like no they just have to fight at the end right that's what this is like finally and so from the very beginning on the other side of this was to be like I'm here to tell you take risks push this you know you know put your true put your true detective into this into this don't talk down to this audience the comic book audience are very intelligent they're very smart they've seen everything before um uh they they they're just as people watching these superhero shows are just as smart as the people who are watching uh the fancy shows that are on HBO all the time yeah so I I try to play both roles I well so I'm I want to push you a little further on your role on the writer's room because I've heard you uh give credit to Chris money I've heard you give credit to Damon Lindelof for a line I've heard you talk about Justin and Vanessa and all of them I want to hear you talk about a pitch or decision that you made in the writer's room that you were sort of most excited wound up being in the final product that you're like this is an idea I had and we executed it and I'm super proud of it brag on yourself Tom do it yeah I'm gonna brag about myself um I I remember what I thought of the um the apple on the head in the are you afraid which opens everything i was i just remember that i couldn't sleep one night it was we were writing the pilot and i was and i just was like how do we how do we get john's origin story to be something slightly more interesting and we added to it so much as it went along but just that initial like i just saw in my mind that sort of opening scene where this father puts an apple on his son's head and says are you afraid and shoots it off and i pitched it the next day to damon and chris and these you know this was my i've worked in a lot of television that like hit walls this is my first thing that we were like we were on the warner brothers lot i was working we were in damon's office with his fucking watchman emmy like yeah incredible you know and and chris is you know telling stories of like working on deadwood back in the day and like you're just like you're so intimidated it's like to go into that room and be like i think this is how we should start the pilot and for those two guys to say yes um was was was a good day did you pitch a red apple this is big for us the apple wars green versus red always uh this is this oh this is such a writer's room kind of thing but like sometimes you you you do these things where you like you pitch the obvious idea because like and then we'll build upon this and then as it as because because things keep going the obvious idea is still there you're like i can't believe this they have an apple on the head like if you're like that's like the first thought anyone has that william tell apple on the head sure you're like so so you pitch that like apple on the head or whatever we think of and then it kind of just well this apple that's still there all these years we would think it's like you jump off a diving board or something but no apple on the head state the whole way i mean he sidestepped the answer so he's not taking sides he's not taking sides in the green versus red apple war which i think you know he who is not team red at the end of the day other than you joe plenty of people mallory as it turns out wait wait wait wait you asked me what i like better red or green apples yeah oh my god no the best is the the red with yellow like it's the yeah no not all red but a honey crisp a honey crisp that's what i'm talking about yeah delicious sour thank you tom tough all red is too mushy it's tough to hear it you gotta get about the bite green apples are very crisp you just had bad green apple listen red apple centered in this television show a beautiful brilliant idea from tom that allowed us to access questions about nature and programming and fear i mean where would we be without red apples oh sure where would we be without red apples taking the place of dead bodies in a poltergeist as haunted horror or sequence mallory rubin let's talk about that for a second actually our guys that was a damon pitch yes that was the apples floating in the water very much i mean spirit of collaboration is really what we're hearing here so beautiful beautiful we love a creative partnership here on this podcast um sinestro just a complete delight across the board uh particularly fun in the finale to see him just shift in real time from pitching john to pitching hal to pitching john based on how his comments were being received and i think that's a really good point i think that's a really good comment i think that's a really good point i think that's a really good point um obviously you know we know there's nothing that you could say about uh a future story but in terms of what comic book fans and people who are familiar with the wider lanterns canon might have been thinking as they saw sinestro in this setting you know our guy is sitting here trapped on a yellow planet drenched in fear toxin shitting himself in terror but also making speeches about weaponizing fear uh would it be appropriate for our comic book fans to be thinking about sinestro core to be thinking about parallax i uh i mean everything is appropriate and i've loved everything i've seen that's such a goddamn political answer i should say something more interesting than that um so i absolutely apologize but but uh i think what's appropriate is is this is to see that i think sinestro hints at the larger world that's worth exploring um both behind this one and you know in the future of the dcu as we already see john's coming back and met up tomorrow this summer um and so i think all of that is there and i think you know if you watch this now the fact that he built this lantern not just a green lantern that has the streaks of yellow in it yeah um and that john is now drawing from a lantern that is unlike any that is is both troubling and inspiring which is what's going to make for good hbo tv um so i think all of all of that is in there um what i like most about the sinestro is the untold story of the sinestro and i think that's what's going to make for a good hbo tv um and that's looking back on this season how impactful that is because it's really sort of what the difference is between the hologram and how is the hologram hasn't gone through that moment where his best friend the person he you know he loves as much as you see him love john at the end of this episode betrays him and he he's the one who has to go off and and and sort of you know and get him you know that's sort of of mice and men you know like taking him taking him behind the rabbit shed at the end you know like he sort of had that um yeah right sweet land like like never did anything wrong that's what made how so honorary and so like the fact that he wouldn't open up to john was because he'd been through something where he'd opened up to someone and gotten completely closed down but that's all off screen and in the performance that that kyle gives um and i think it's it's an incredible story that has yet to be fully told i was really curious about that in this finale conference confrontation how seems like quite ready to be like shut up sinestro i'm team john here that hologram who has not gone through that traumatic event with sinestro yet so at what point does the hologram you know who we were thinking he would be conflicted because here's his mentor who he doesn't know betrayed him but maybe did the hologram get a download about did he like go on wikipedia like carrie did and look at like what sinestro did like how did how did he know to to to to not take his word for it i i mean it's it we have a eight episodes of how saying trust my he trusts his gut and i feel like he's on a he's on a weird planet he sees a guy who's very old and and strapped to a chair ranting like an evil person i think i'll trust his gut and say i'm gonna trust john over sinestro fair enough fair enough yeah i thought it was like in a surprising but really satisfying way it felt to me kind of more impactful actually that hal chose to reject sinestro's temptations that he wasn't vulnerable to them despite not having gone through that because it felt like a way to kind of um you know solidify and cement really what the hologram and john in this just short a little burst of time were able to achieve together which then really you know amplifies all of the other messages about if you open yourself up if you're if you're able to not feel like you need to repress or tamp down your fear but you're able to examine it you know and work with other people to try to navigate it so i i quite quite loved that great stuff um we only have a few more minutes do you have a few more minutes of course thank you so much i'm sitting here feeling guilty for the apple thing so let's see look on face i i don't think you should i think siding with uh siding with team red was the right decision and you should feel you should feel great there are plenty of luminaries on team green i'm doing fine they name the most harsh candy after green apple if you want to like punish a friend you give them the green apple flavor i love green apple jelly ranchers they're delicious more of them for you we buy a share bag yeah cherry is better so so is watermelon yeah um while we're talking about food should we should we go to the source here should we ask tom about billy's dip please what kind of dip does billy make what's billy making signature special dip i threw out like seven layer dip or taco dip joe thought maybe like a buffalo chicken what do you think is this actual canon is it head canon is there an answer um oh my god so so the the show takes place in rushville because my uh that's the town my grandmother is from um i grew up in los angeles my grandma was from a very rural town and i was a you know single mother when like a lot of single mothers are half raised by my grandma and um so she was sort of telling me stories about a little bit and uh after she passed away i got a recipe book from her and it was like i was like i was like an old nebraska and there was something in it called the dip um and it just reminds me and my wife always makes fun of it because it was literally like a pound of velveta a pound of and a pound of heavy cream yes portable and mixed yes and that's the dip so i knew it i knew that it was meat heavy i knew it i should have said beef though of course amazing disgusting and we should try it we should try the dip yeah a midwestern special and it comes with a salad which is just a head of lettuce and a bottle of ranch dressing incredible correct yeah with some bacon hopefully sprinkled on top um mallory uh mallory just asked a very neat question i'm gonna ask a very mallory question which is about sex i'm loving this all right it is it's about well it's about the location of where we find earl in the post-fire bachelor pad the like shotgun setup bachelor pad that we that we see that hal has moved into after the fire earl is perched right next to the bed and we were both a little concerned about that we're not sure how much time carrie and hal had together after the fire but if we're going to be able to do it we're going to have to do it we're going to have to do it they did um do you feel like earl was traumatized by uh what hal and carrie got up to how we know canonically leaves his boots on during sex so like what do you think earl bore witness to i think earl he's been around the block a few times he's seen some things and and you know i'm i'm not gonna yuck someone's yum whatever whatever was working for them work for the three of them that's all there you go there you go okay okay confirmation threesome love it okay you know again not confirming it's not i'm just saying world is open to pot well that's what hal says at one point the world is a big place you know it's all yeah when you've experienced the the pleasures of the galaxy you know we could just amend the second clause of that sentence it's like why shouldn't your uh your your greenhouse plant who eats how many pounds of raw bison a day uh watch you fuck there you go it all tracks um i'd like to ask you now about football not confirming that remember remember when tom started this conversation i was like yeah i know because is it okay to swear and also like oh like let's let's let's start with uh these these this beautiful poetry and now we're just like can we ask you about dip and uh whether earl watched uh hal and carrie have sex i'd like to stick with the really profound stuff for a minute and ask you about noah macon's football career um i this this is animated i mean the ringer you know we do sports and pop culture like this is just animated so much conversation here at the ringer and the group chats on slack in the office everyone's buzzing i'm ready to defend some some some indefensible things well i mean we could talk about you know whether you could become an all-state quarterback with that offensive line all of it but i'm curious if you have in mind either an nfl or a college football comp because obviously based on some of the schools that noah was considering but also we got to glimpse him in action in the finale we saw him you know we saw him handing off we saw him scrambling a lot right he's definitely a dual threat quarterback he's running he's too small to be josh allen but maybe he can match the rushing touchdowns is he supposed to be like johnny manziel just in a football respect obviously is he supposed to be tim tebow you know on the nebraska front is he tebow light is he taylor martinez like what what what is noah macon's makeup here as a quarterback i feel like the size doesn't quite line up but i'm gonna say yeah young i'm gonna go steve young wow okay so noah's is bound for a big career here this is exciting well i'm saying this like steve was you know he he was patient he watched you know he watched montana play for all those years and he knew like someday would all be his and someday and if you've ever seen steve he's talking like he's like the most philosophical guy he's he got the x's and o's but he's also like let let me also get my law degree on the side and like like you're like oh this guy could also run for senate but he just happens to be throwing a football but he also is like an incredible runner what we see so i feel like steve young is a pretty good comp i feel like we'll see no on pti eventually every every tuesday breaking down games can i seem very calm i was wondering if he was going to be like a nervous scrambler like baker mayfield but no he seemed very composed in the in the pocket in the shotgun he's a thinking guy he's he knows all the plates for sure yeah in the in the world of sports figures you could have referenced the fact that you mentioned steve young and joe montana 49er quarterbacks from like the 80s and 90s the only people i could possibly recognize is like very very kind so thank you so much that one must be thank you sports show what a time to be sports joe those are names i know um okay listen uh let's keep it sports-esque um you talk a lot about the coaching tree of like sinestro to how to john and sort of how these things get passed down um abin sir is in the mix of course um i'm curious you know we get this parting wisdom of don't be afraid to be afraid is that the most important how a lesson of how that imparts to john what's what's the most important thing that how taught john whether it's the hologram or og flavor how uh imparted to our new official green lantern inside of the dc universe live action i mean i think it's up for debate and people can say i think don't be afraid of being phrased big but but to me especially when i look at that episode where he lands um to me it's the idea of forgiveness and of of of of that when you forgive someone you can let your anger go um and you can you know it's it's that old um aa thing that that at some point your crime's not about you know you you did the bad thing you did the bad thing but it's weighing so hard on me i have to let it go and i have to let you go um and i i think he has so much we've all had these people that were just so close to me care so much about them and they're so close to how they how much they think about us and whether they like us or hate us and we just live or die by little microaggressions yeah and um and that can just eat you up inside and you're just like going over moments and moments in your head i think what what he learns from how is is that you you can you can let you yeah you can forgive that person for those microaggressions and sort of you can see their trauma and see it from their perspective and see how where they how they got to where they are and giving you the love they have denied and i think that's that's it yeah i i love that so much i mean you you heard me say that apples yeah yeah you heard me say this already today but i just i was really across the season in the finale in particular with you know with carrie with how with noah with with his parents just really struck by the grace john is able to find for other people and the forgiveness that he is able to grant them and thus help them grant themselves is really uh affirming i think thing for a lot of people to to see um and just you know of all the heroic attributes that we get to witness and john i think really one of the most remarkable and undeniable um you know and i love thinking about all of the things that we witnessed in his journey that helped him get to that point but then of course it's exciting for us as fans who have become so attached to this version of the character to think about what it does for him moving forward in the future how he lives his life how he navigates his relationships and how he assumes the mantle of earth's green lantern which is a mantle that he reforged you know in an episode where the idea of forging and reforging comes up many times that he reforged for himself so you know we we couldn't get off without talking to you about the oath of course and the idea of john crafting and reforging the oath in a way that genuinely in this question of programming and your nature and the path and the choices you make felt like a way to pay off all of those things for him and for the larger themes of the show that this was a character who worked his way to this place by assessing and navigating and trying to understand all of the things that other people had done and all of the things that he had done and then how to make the choice that was right for him for the reasons that meant something to him um you know for you what did that feel like for for for john as one of the people who helped bring this version of john to the screen what did it feel like to watch aaron perform that oath i mean it was just like astonishing it was gobsmacking and you know what did it feel like in that larger kind of of of macro and meta sense to be able to put this show's version of this iconic thing out into the world which obviously just parallels so beautifully with those ideas about forging your own way that's so well put um i first i mean in talking about sort of where john lands i what i think is there's two sides there's the forgiveness side we see but also there's the idea that he's not like oh i forgive you therefore i can walk away because you're all good and i'm not going to forgive you because you're all good and i'm not good he's like because i forgive you and because you're going to be a man hunter out in the world i have to put on a ring and be the one who guarantees you don't become a crazy person like it's he doesn't say forgive them and walk away he forgives them and says okay now i have a because i forgive you we're now connected and now you become a burden to me because you become responsibility to me um and um and i think what's distinct in that and what goes into what you were just talking about is is john's a lot of bands been given a lot of responsibility throughout his very baby like you are responsible for this family his brother called him chosen like like you you like literally his parents were like we're going to get divorced this whole family's going to fall apart unless we put it all on john's shoulders and he and he can carry us and they're like it's not fair and they know he's going to hate us literally they say that but they're like that so he's been carrying that so he's been carrying all those burdens and at the end of five we see him say fuck it he lets go of the burdens that people have given him and that's one step in revelation is to let go of the burdens the next step is to say okay i don't want to be a burden given to me but i don't mind taking on my own burdens right like like and that's what this last step is about where he's like there's a difference between what's put on my back and what i put on my own back um and then he when he when he so when he takes that oath he's not chosen anymore he's making a choice um and and so he's saying i and part of that is being like i'm not going to say this oath that everyone else says i'm a different kind of person i'm making a choice to be my own person and so that was that was all in that last open yet and aaron i mean from day one i met him like i immediately just called him superhero as a nickname i just you can't understand this six three gorgeous it just looks like he came out of it i said this before but it really feels like you're talking to chris hammondsworth and the avengers you're just like you know that movie's gonna come where he's gonna come from where everyone's losing and then he appears from the sky and the audience goes nuts um and uh and that's how you feel when you meet aaron but that's one thing to look that way and to embody that way but also to get the other side of the emotional content and to do it all not in his own accents um except for the one line which was actually pretty fucking awesome um but it's absolutely stunning and the dude is down to earth like no pretensions no movie star nothing like i remember when they were on set and like a little short list of like who's gonna be james bond came out and he was on it and i was like how do you go to work and like and like everyone's like are you james bond he's like all right let's go it's like did i ask him about this he must know like his agent must have called him oh my god amazing but totally down to earth and just making jokes and super cool that's awesome well thank you so much tom king for your time and for your work and for your larger body of work which i'm such a fan of and um we appreciate you so much Thank you, Tom. This is awesome. Thank you for being there. Thank you for doing this. Thank you for talking about this show. It's a show that only exists because people talk about it. It's a hard show to recommend, but since everyone's talking about it, everybody watches it. So you've literally put food on my kid's table, and I'm incredibly grateful. Come back and join us again sometime in the future. Please. Anytime. All right. So, tough look for me because Team Green lost another one. Big Apple Wars elf for Jill. It's true. It's true. Big win on the dip front, though, I would say, and big win on the potential intergalactic plant threesomes front for both of us. Quite agree. Look, we did a taste test at this very table when we were talking with Tyson and Riley about Survivor. I think we should make that dip. I agree. Great. It sounded disgusting, but also probably delicious. It sounded delicious. Absolutely delicious. Like, it could be both. You know what I mean? No question. Delicious in real time. And then full of regret later. Then you have some regrets later. Tale as old as time. You know, will we actually do it? I don't know. That's why you have to follow OutHouseOfOurPod. I keep saying OutHouseOfOurPod. God, let me improve. But listen, for this one, it might be OutHouseOfOurPod. At HouseOfOurPod on Instagram and TikTok. But maybe like a collab crossover with OutHouseOfOur for this particular one. The moment might have arrived. We'll find out. As we mentioned, come back for the full deep dive on Monday morning. Thanks so much. Thanks. Thanks. Thanks. Thanks. Thanks so much to Tom King. Thank you, Tom. Thanks to our team. Squad. Thanks to you, Mallory Rubin. Thank you to you, Joanna Robinson. And we'll see you soon. Bye.