Lanterns has spent most of its first season keeping things deliberately vague, dropping clues here and there while sending viewers down a few wrong paths along the way. Episode 5 finally pulls back the curtain on one of its biggest secrets. Zoe, played by Poorna Jagannathan, is revealed to be an undercover Manhunter, an alien creature that has been living among humans while hiding what she really is. And somehow, she managed to keep John Stewart from figuring it out too.
The reveal also makes some of Zoe’s earlier behavior look very different. Jagannathan has said she had several conversations with showrunner Chris Mundy about how Zoe should behave once the secret was out. At first, the actress wondered whether Zoe should become more obviously alien after the reveal, but Mundy didn’t want to go that route. Zoe has spent so long pretending to be human that the act has become much more than an act. She has picked up real human emotions and behaviors along the way, so there isn’t much reason for her to suddenly start behaving like an alien just because the audience now knows the truth.
What really separates Zoe from the humans around her is her instinct to survive. Jagannathan explained that Zoe will do pretty much whatever she has to do to stay alive, and that includes forming relationships when those relationships are useful to her. It’s a pretty bleak way of looking at human connection, but it explains quite a bit about Zoe.
Her relationship with John is probably the clearest example. Zoe had the chance to save him earlier, but she deliberately waited until he was in a much worse position before stepping in. On the surface, it looked like she was simply helping him when he needed it most. In reality, she was making sure that John would have every reason to trust her afterward. The rescue wasn’t exactly an act of kindness. It was a way for Zoe to create an alliance that could help keep her alive.
The show also had another trick up its sleeve with William Macon, played by Garret Dillahunt. For a while, the character seemed like a much more obvious suspect, which made it easier for the series to keep Zoe hidden in plain sight. Jagannathan jokingly called Macon the “decoy” in an interview, while Dillahunt pointed out that his character was simply doing his job well. He was convincing enough to make viewers look in the wrong direction, which only made Zoe’s eventual reveal work better.
Now that John knows what Zoe really is, things are obviously going to get a lot more complicated heading into the final episodes. He has spent all this time building a relationship with someone who was hiding an enormous secret from him, and that makes the fallout difficult to predict. HBO still hasn’t officially announced a second season of Lanterns, although reports say a writers’ room is already working on ideas for where the story could go next.
Whatever happens with the show, John Stewart isn’t going anywhere in the DC Universe. Aaron Pierre is expected to return as John alongside Nathan Fillion’s Guy Gardner in Man of Tomorrow. And after the events of Episode 5, it certainly feels like Zoe’s reveal could be much bigger than just one season’s twist. There may be a lot more waiting underneath this story, especially for John and whatever the DCU ultimately plans to do with its Green Lanterns.