You’d have thought that Ryan Reynolds’ Green Lantern not appearing in Zack Snyder’s Justice League was pretty cut and dry seeing as the actor’s infamous box office bomb occupies an entirely different plane of existence from the SnyderVerse, he’s spent years mocking the movie at every opportunity and not once has he publicly voiced any sort of desire to reprise the role of Hal Jordan.
However, that didn’t stop the rumor mill from going into overdrive that he could end up making a surprise guest appearance in the Snyder Cut. At one stage, there were claims that his deal was signed, sealed and delivered, only for the next batch of speculation to swiftly backtrack and say he was actually too busy.
Then his name was in the headlines again when news of a top secret cameo filtered out, with Reynolds quickly hopping onto social media to deny it was him, and it turned out to be Harry Lennix’s Martian Manhunter all along. Snyder did admit he toyed with the idea of recruiting Hal Jordan for a fan-baiting spot in Justice League, but that’s about as far along the thought process as it went.
The filmmaker also went on to reveal that he almost quit the project altogether after Warner Bros. forced him to drop John Stewart, but insider Daniel Richtman is reporting that the plans were much bigger than that. According to the tipster, Snyder wanted Ryan Reynolds to make a full-time comeback in the DCEU as Green Lantern and even go on to train Stewart in the ways of the Corps, but WB apparently shut the whole thing down.
Of course, this one should probably be taken with a hefty helping of salt when Reynolds has never entertained the idea of playing Green Lantern again as far as we’re aware, never mind returning on a permanent basis. But there’s certainly been a lot of chatter about the possibility of it happening and at this point, we wouldn’t rule it out just yet.