Sinestro Trained Hal Jordan, Yet Became His Greatest Enemy
In the comics and in HBO's Lanterns, Sinestro was Hal Jordan's teacher before he was his nemesis. Here is how the mentor turned, and where he stands before the finale.
Gil Kane drew the hero from Paul Newman and the villain from David Niven. Two film stars, one artist, and a rivalry that has now run 65 years. When I went looking for why Sinestro matters so much to Hal Jordan in HBO's Lanterns, the answer started in a classroom, not a battlefield.
That is the part casual viewers miss. Sinestro was not Hal's first enemy. He was Hal's teacher.
The best Green Lantern in the room
DC's official profile calls Thaal Sinestro the greatest Green Lantern before he became the Corps' greatest enemy. He came from the planet Korugar and served as the Lantern of Sector 1417, where he was admired for keeping order. The price of that order was that he ruled his home planet more like a dictator than a protector.
Hal was the rookie assigned to him. In the comics, per Sinestro's publication history, Sinestro trained Jordan with harsh methods, and it was Hal who, disobeying orders, exposed what was happening on Korugar. The Guardians expelled Sinestro and banished him to an antimatter universe, where the Weaponers of Qward handed him a yellow ring and sent him back for revenge. The student turned in the teacher. Neither of them ever got over it.
John Broome and Kane created him for Green Lantern #7, cover-dated August 1961, according to that same history. One small note from my checking: Deadline's 2025 casting story gives a different issue number, so if you are buying a back issue, confirm it with a comic shop before you pay.
Why green against yellow is the whole argument
A Green Lantern's ring runs on willpower. Sinestro's runs on fear. That is not only a costume change. In DC's telling, Sinestro still believes everything he does is for the good of the universe, and his Sinestro Corps exists partly to prove the Guardians have held their own Lanterns back. His oath says it plainly.
In blackest day, in brightest night, beware your fears made into light. Let those who try to stop what's right, burn like my power, Sinestro's might!
I find this the richest contrast in superhero comics. The teacher who drilled a fearless pupil builds an army out of the very thing that pupil is famous for lacking.
Where Sinestro stands in Lanterns
Danish actor Ulrich Thomsen, best known in the US as Kai Proctor on Banshee, plays him in a recurring role. Deadline's casting report described this Sinestro as ruthless yet undeniably charming, with a manipulative, enduring obsession with his former mentee. The Comic-Con trailer gave viewers their first look at him.
By episode 6 he is loose. In that episode, Guy Gardner brings word that Sinestro has escaped from a space prison, which Guy calls "Spazkaban," per The Ringer. A Green Lantern giving an intergalactic prison a nickname that silly is exactly the kind of joke this grim show earns and then wisely leaves alone.
Episode 7, which aired Sunday, September 27, 2026, brings him face to face with the Halogram, the holographic backup of Hal that John has woken. Deadline reports that the ruined planet John and the Halogram reach is where Sinestro has been hiding all along. There he takes the Halogram hostage and repeats a line from Hal's father, "Great arm, kid," before escaping, per The Ringer. It is a chilling choice. A mentor quoting a father is a man claiming both jobs.
Sinestro, in brief
- First comic
- Green Lantern #7, cover-dated August 1961
- Created by
- John Broome and Gil Kane
- Home world
- Korugar, Sector 1417
- Relationship to Hal
- Former instructor, then archenemy
- Played in Lanterns by
- Ulrich Thomsen
- Earlier screen version
- Mark Strong, in the 2011 Green Lantern film
What the finale might do with him
The season ends on Sunday, October 4, 2026, on HBO. We do not know what Sinestro wants from a hologram of his old student, and I have not seen a credible report that says. Anyone who tells you the finale's plot is guessing.
What the comics promise is a relationship that never resolves cleanly. Wikipedia's Hal Jordan entry still lists him as Hal's archenemy and corrupt former mentor, in that order. Somewhere on a drawing table in 1961, Kane put Niven's pencil moustache across from Newman's grin, and they have been staring at each other ever since.
Sources
Every factual claim above traces to one of these. Links open in a new tab.
- Sinestro character profile
- Sinestro
- Hal Jordan
- Ulrich Thomsen To Play DC Supervillain Sinestro In HBO's 'Lanterns'
- Lanterns Trailer: Sinestro Revealed, Guy Gardner Cameo, Manhunters
- 'Lanterns' Episode 6 Recap: HBO Meets DCU
- 'Lanterns' Episode 7 Recap: No-Hit Hal
- 'Lanterns': Aaron Pierre & Kyle Chandler Talk Penultimate Episode
