Lanterns Trailer Name Drops One of DC’s Weirdest Heroes

Even those of us who love the first teaser for the HBO Max show Lanterns have to admit that it’s pretty light on the superhero stuff. It might be about space cops, and it might feature a founding member of the Justice League, but most of the teaser features Hal Jordan (Kyle Chandler) and new recruit John Stewart (Aaron Pierre) traveling across the Nebraska countryside in plainclothes.

That is until the final seconds. That’s when Stewart asks Jordan if he ever talks to any other Green Lanterns. Jordan scoffs at the suggestion, (wisely) ignoring Guy Gardner to claim that he’s the only human before observing, “One of them’s a fucking squirrel.” That squirrel is a surprising deep dive for a teaser with little DC Comics lore, drawing attention to the late and loony Ch’p of H’lven.

Ch’p first appeared in 1982’s Green Lantern #148, as part of the “Tales of the Green Lantern Corps” backup stories that regularly ran after the main story. Written by Paul Kupperberg and drawn by Don Newton, the story introduces Ch’p as the noble defender of the planet H’lven, also populated by intelligent squirrels. The Guardians of the Universe, the founders and chiefs of the Green Lantern Corps, order Ch’p to come to the aid of the planet Berrith, whose dog-like inhabitants threatened to destroy H’lven long ago.

Ch’p soon became a regular fixture in Green Lantern, especially when he and several other members of the Corps were permanently stationed on Earth around the time of Crisis on Infinite Earths. That period saw the most development for his character, where he was the playful, sensitive counterpart to the cold and calculating Lantern Salaak. Artist Joe Stanton started drawing Ch’p less like a real squirrel and more like Mickey Mouse, which led writer Steve Englehart to add more Disney-inspired characters from H’lven, including girlfriend M’nn’e, best friend D’ll, and arch-enemy Doctor Ub’x.

As a favorite among fans but largely unknown to those who don’t read Green Lantern comics, Ch’p was the perfect candidate to get a tragic death. So in a 1992 issue of John Stewart’s solo book Green Lantern: Mosiac, Ch’p gets hit by a truck created by villain Sinestro. Ch’p’s roadkill end matched the tragic comedy that has always marked the character, an effect lessened some by the fact that he returned as an energy ghost until Mosiac ended a year later.

Since then, Ch’p was succeeded by fellow H’lvenite B’dg, who was introduced in 2011’s Green Lantern Corps #1 and currently serves as a member of the Blue Lantern Corps. Ch’p remains alive in other media, having appeared in a few episodes of the Green Lantern animated series that ran between 2011 and 2013 and, most recently, in the kid’s movie DC League of Super-Pets, where he was voiced by Andor‘s Diego Luna.

Ch’p is a weird character, but he’s not a weird Lantern. Throughout the ’70s and ’80s, the Green Lantern Corps gained plenty of oddball members, ranging from the blind, sound-based Lantern Rot Lop Fan to the living planet Mogo to Arkkis Chummuck, who’s basically just a giant head. The teaser for Lanterns certainly keeps things tethered to the Earth, but the very fact that its acknowledging Ch’p’s existence indicates that the DCU’s Green Lantern Corps is just as weird and varied as the group in the comics.

Lanterns premieres on HBO Max in August 2026.