The actor behind the character talks the episode 4 reveal.

The Manhunter speaks: Lanterns star explains how the big twist ‘reframed everything’

The actor behind the character talks the episode 4 reveal.

By Nick Romano

Nick Romano

Nick Romano is a senior editor at ** with 15 years of journalism experience covering entertainment. His work previously appeared in Vanity Fair, Vulture, IGN, and more.

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September 6, 2026 10:00 p.m. ET

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John Stewart (Aaron Pierre) and Hal Jordan (Kyle Chandler) on ‘Lanterns’. Credit:

John Johnson/HBO Max

- The actor behind the Manhunter on *Lanterns* discusses the big reveal.

- Star explains how the twist “reframed everything” about the character for them.

- The cast member points to an earlier scene that means something different with hindsight.

**Warning: This article contains spoilers for *Lanterns* episode 4.**

There’s an irony to the name Manhunter on HBO and DC’s *Lanterns*, which revealed the character’s identity during the course of the fourth episode. The mystery android at the center of John (Aaron Pierre) and Hal’s (Kyle Chandler) investigation presents as female.

It even caught the star behind the role, Poorna Jagannathan, by surprise when she read the episode 4 script and realized Zoe is the one everyone’s looking for.

“I wasn’t told when I got the role that she was the Manhunter. I had to read it to find that out,” the actress, recently cast in *Big Mistakes* season 2, shares with **. “I was blindsided like you have never seen me. I was shocked. I think part of the reason I was so blindsided is I just assumed it’d be a man. And when I died the first time in the car, I was like, ‘Oh okay. Yep, makes sense. I died in worse ways. No problem. Bye bye. Thank you for having me.’”

Poorna Jagannathan as Zoe/the Manhunter on ‘Lanterns’.

John Johnson/HBO Max

The twist didn’t shock Garret Dillahunt, who plays William Macon, one of the prime suspects to be the Manhunter. “We knew *someone* was the Manhunter, and I knew it wasn’t me,” he comments.

The latest episode sees Zoe leaving the coital embrace of John Stewart in his motel room when a red laser fires out of the clouds from an orbital satellite, seemingly obliterating her in an explosion. But even after tracking down the supposed culprit — Hector Gutierrez posing as DC comics villain Hector Hammond — the revelation of the Manhunter’s identity and Zoe’s survival from the incident comes to light during a tense confrontation between the two space cops.

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“It really blew me away that I’d be cast in something like this or they saw me as something like this,” Jagannathan says. “The truth is they really tried to humanize this Manhunter, who is a victim of what the Guardians have created, a victim of her programming, a victim of perception. So they really wanted this Manhunter to feel human emotions, and yet her programming will always get the better of her, even at times that she doesn’t want it. So I was struck by how much humanity they imbued in even the character that’s supposed to be the most evil.”

Aaron Pierre and Poorna Jagannathan on ‘Lanterns’.

Matt Kennedy/HBO Max

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The discovery in episode 4, as well as episode 5, reframed the character’s actions in Jagannathan’s mind. She discusses the bar scene in the premiere, where Zoe is strategically placed in the background of the bar counter conversation between John and Hal before making her move.

“She basically identifies her biggest threat and will have sex with them. Do you know what I mean? That’s her MO,” Jagannathan explains. “She will initiate the most intimate relationship with a person who has anything to do with her extinction, and she will flip them. Everything in hindsight becomes so much more strategic. And along the way, Aaron becomes more than just a strategic move on the chessboard. He becomes more to her, so much so that, I don’t know if you caught it, but in 4, she actually tells John Stewart who she is.”

In the aftermath of their latest tryst in John’s motel room, as they’re lying in bed, Zoe admits she was the one who saved Macon’s life back in the day. “That’s her way of showing John that it is me and there’s nothing to be afraid of and I’m not a threat, so just go home,” the actress continues. “So, yeah, it reframed everything for me.”

New episodes of *Lanterns* continue to premiere on HBO and HBO Max every Sunday at 9 p.m. ET/PT.

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Source: “EW Superhero”