We live in truly glorious times if you’re a comics nerd. Just look at this week’s episode of CW’s The Flash, which (spoilers!) featured the Scarlet Speedster fighting alongside Green Arrow and Firestorm to take down the Reverse-Flash. (If I could go back in time and tell ten-year-old me that would one day be an ordinary thing on TV, he wouldn’t believe me.) But amidst all the awesome action, the show managed to drop a fairly big hint at another classic DC character possibly coming to the DC TV universe: none other than Hal Jordan, the Green Lantern.

The Hal Jordan reference came in a scene where the Flash was trying to use a Ferris Air hanger for a covert operation. Captain Cold said, “Wasn’t this place shut down?” to which Barry responded, “It did. One of their test pilots disappeared.” Well, comics fans know the test pilot who disappeared is none other than Hal Jordan. Jordan was whisked away by dying Lantern Abin Sur and given his ring, which began his career as a member of the Green Lantern Corps. There really is almost no other character they could be talking about.

So why do I think we’ll be seeing Hal show up sooner rather than later? Three reasons: #1) Historically in the comics, Hal Jordan has been best friends with both Barry Allen and Oliver Queen, and even shared a comic with Ollie for the better part of a decade. #2) Rumor has it that the Justice League movie’s Green Lantern will be none other than John Stewart, matching the now-classic Justice League animated series, leaving Hal off the table for the movies. #3) Maybe most importantly, The Flash and Arrow producer Greg Berlanti is a big Hal fan, and actually produced the failed 2011 Green Lantern movie. Although that might give you pause, as someone who has read the original script for his version of Green Lantern, it was pretty great and the version that hit theaters bore little resemblance to the original. And his work on Arrow and The Flash shows that given free reign, he knows his DC comics characters as well as any fan.

Green Lantern as a solo series might still be too expensive to do on a network budget, since so much of it would have to take place in space, but having Hal become a part of The Flash and Arrow universe as a frequent guest star makes a ton of sense. He could maybe even feature on the upcoming third DC/CW show Legends of Tomorrow. And if this time he’s done right, it could salvage Hal’s reputation from the failed movie, and then everybody’s happy.

Featured image courtesy of deviantArt // artist: DanielGoettig