According to a report published by Jeff “The In” Sneider, HBO has officially passed on an adaptation of Alan Moore‘s V for Vendetta.
Developed for HBO by writer Pete Jackson as a period-piece drama tracking a dystopian, fascist regime, WBD has moved on from the potential streaming series.
“I’m now told that HBO has passed on Jackson’s script,” said Sneider. “One source told me that Jackson delivered a period-themed take on the material, while HBO was curious to see what a more modern take on a political anarchist might look like.”
Variety first reported on the development of the series in November.
More than eight years have passed since Marvel Studios’ One Above All, Kevin Feige, first claimed that Nova was a character with “immediate potential” to debut in the MCU. After several starts and stops, it looks like the Human Rocket is being prepared for launch again, this time with a Marvel Studios veteran scribe at the helm.
…we have a big board with a bunch of characters that have more immediate potential, Nova is on that board. Because of the connection to the Guardians universe, because there are more than one examples to pull from in the comics that are interesting. And you’re absolutely right, he was in the earliest drafts of the [Guardians of the Galaxy].
Given the dates listed, it looks as though Marvel Television might be looking at beginning production sometime this year with a potential 2027 release date for the series. Neither Disney nor Waldron’s reps responded to requests for confirmation at the time of publishing.
The cosmic architecture of X-Men ’97 Season 2 just pulled off an immaculate, long-game continuity play. While general audiences were reeling from the structural tragedy of En Sabah Nur’s transformation into Apocalypse, fans of the original series were hooked on the precise moment Rama-Tut boarded his Sphinx-ship to flee the ancient Nile Delta.
That single, frantic chronological exit doesn’t just clear the stage for the rest of the season—it acts as the direct, canonical origin point for a memorable episode original 1992 animated series: Season 2, Episode 6, “X-ternally Yours.”
The Chronological Collision
The answer how a time-traveling variant of Kang the Conqueror connects straight back to Gambit’s murky past in the Louisiana bayou, might well be found in the physical energy discharged during his frantic escape.
When Rama-Tut activates his Celestial-fused hyper-drive to escape Apocalypse’s localized gravity weapon, the spatial monitors inside his ship display, it’s possible that the massive chronological wake doesn’t just shoot him forward into the future; it changes Candra from an average human into the X-Ternal.
First introduced in the OG series, Candra is an immortal who demands a systematic tithe from ordinary mortals in exchange for immense wealth and arcane power. X-Men ’97 may have just brilliantly retconned the character by establishing that Candra is actually utilizing the residual, leaking chronal energy left behind by Rama-Tut’s ancient ship to sustain her immortality until her original appearance in the 1990s. She isn’t a mystical goddess; she is a cosmic opportunist feeding on the temporal radiation bleeding out of the Egyptian rift.
The Legacy of the Tithe
This directly sets up the entire cyclical blood-feud explored in “X-Ternally Yours.” To keep the chronal energy stabilized and maintain their respective domains, Candra forced a strict, generational pact between New Orleans’ two rival underworld factions:
The Thieves Guild: Heavily tied to Gambit and hBella Donna’s family.
The Assassins Guild: The ruthless, hyper-lethal counterparts of the thieves.
Every ten years, both guilds are forced to present an offering—The Tithe—to remain under Candra’s protection and to retain the powers given to them by her. X-Men ’97 smartly delivers a subtle thematic payoff. It proves that Gambit’s tragic childhood, the criminal wars of the bayou, and the dark bargains of the Thieves Guild were all just microscopic, ripples caused by a single, desperate time-traveler trying to outrun the dawn of Apocalypse.
Marvel Animation is not pulling its punches. Following last week’s massive, time-skipping three-episode premiere block, today’s highly anticipated fourth episode—”Rise of Apocalypse: Part II”—delivers a devastating, tragic conclusion to the series’ ancient Egyptian arc.
The episode formally seals the fate of En Sabah Nur, proving that despite the X-Men’s desperate multiversal intervention, the loop of history remains entirely unbreakable.
Picking up directly from the cliffhanger in 3000 B.C., the episode opens with Magneto utilizing the absolute peak of his magnetic capabilities to shield himself and the time-displaced team from a catastrophic blast. While they survive, so does a highly traumatized En Sabah Nur following the death of his nomadic mentor, Baal.
In a desperate, final bid to alter the future, Xavier unmasks their identities to Nur, convincing him to form a temporary, uneasy alliance to hunt down the ancient, Celestial temple housing Rama-Tut’s reality-altering technology. However, the philosophical rift between the team’s founders immediately dooms the mission. Xavier attempts to counsel Nur toward passive diplomacy and integration, while a deeply hardened, post-Genosha Magneto reinforces Nur’s raw survivalist rage, accidentally acting as the catalyst for his radicalization.
When the team finally breaches the inner sanctum of the futuristic temple–which is revealed to be Ship–they are intercepted by Rama-Tut (the time-traveling variant of Kang the Conqueror), who telepathically warns Xavier that preventing Nur’s evolution is simply not possible. A massive, multi-tiered brawl erupts, but the X-Men ultimately fail to restrain Nur. Driven by an overwhelming “Survival of the Fittest” ethos, Nur steps directly into the Celestial-tech machinery, permanently merging his biology with the alien infrastructure to formally transform into Apocalypse.
The Ultimate Sacrifice
With an omnipotent tyrant unleashed, the city descends into utter chaos. Apocalypse launches a devastating black hole directly above Rama-Tut’s city to erase the timeline’s variables. While Rama-Tut cowardly boards his Sphinx-ship to escape back to the future–but not before a little tease about the future of one of his top people–Magneto steps up to save the innocent population.
In a staggering, visually breathtaking display of raw power that’s becoming a staple of X-Men ’97‘s animation, Magneto single-handedly repels Apocalypse’s gravity weapon, but the feat leaves him gravely, life-threateningly injured. Recognizing they are outmatched, a battered Magneto takes the blame and uses the temporal energy to send Rogue, Nightcrawler, and Beast hurtling back toward the 1990s. However, before the portal snaps shut, Apocalypse violently intercepts the beam, trapping a horrified Charles Xavier behind in the ancient past to mourn over the loss of his friend…until Bishop time hops to his rescue.
The long, grueling two-year hiatus is finally over. Marvel Animation officially unleashed a colossal, three-episode premiere block for X-Men ’97 Season 2 on Disney+.
Picking up immediately from the jaw-dropping, multiversal cliffhangers of the Season 1 finale, the debut episodes—“Days of Past Future”, “A Force to Be Reckoned With”, and “Rise of Apocalypse: Part I”—deliver a relentlessly paced, gorgeously animated masterclass in comic-book soap opera that splits our heroes across the space-time continuum.
The premiere wastes zero time addressing the team’s fractured displacement. In Episode 1, Forge and Bishop hatch a desperate, cross-temporal rescue mission. Forge jumps to a desolate, tech-fused future to retrieve the frontline roster: Cyclops, Jean Grey, Storm, Morph, and a bone-clawed Wolverine recovering from Magneto’s brutal adamantium extraction.
This future group is hiding out in the camp of Mother Askani, where Scott and Jean have spent months secretly raising their infant son, Nathan.
The timeline turns into a nightmare when Apocalypse’s modern cyber-hounds track them down. Desperate to harvest Nathan’s pristine techno-organic genetics to use as a permanent physical host, Apocalypse’s prime forces launch a brutal raid, capturing Scott, Jean, and the child. It takes a massive, solar-flare-fueled counter-offensive from Storm—and the emotional revelation to Nathan that Scott and Jean are his actual biological parents—to break their restraints and send a young Cable merging with the base’s sentient “SHIP” computer.
The Present: Enter X-Force and X-Factor
While half the team is trapped in the time stream, Episode 2 shifts its focus back to the 1990s, showcasing how a broken, leaderless world reacts to the apparent demise of the X-Men.
With the mutant population facing extreme governmental persecution, a heavily altered opening title sequence formally introduces X-Force. Led by a fully grown, battle-hardened Cable, this militant, no-nonsense faction recruits Jubilee and Sunspot to wage an aggressive, preemptive war against the lingering remnants of Apocalypse’s inner circle.
The tactical friction spikes when Valerie Cooper fields X-Factor—a clean-cut, government-sanctioned mutant task force deployed to round up mutant runaways. A highly coordinated ambush leads to Jubilee’s brief capture, forcing a high-octane rescue sequence that sees a newly returned Polaris turn heel to blow the government compound wide open.
The premiere block wraps with Episode 3, bringing audiences directly to the ancient Nile Delta where Professor Charles Xavier, Magneto, Rogue, Nightcrawler, and Beast have been marooned.
Attempting to blend into the ancient landscape, the marooned icons cross paths with a younger, uncorrupted version of the mythic mutant En Sabah Nur long before his evolution into the blue-lipped despot. Bishop arrives via Forge’s time machine with explicit structural instructions to prevent his ascension entirely. However, the rescue plan is thrown into absolute disarray by an unexpected cosmic traveler: Rama-Tut (a legendary, time-traveling variant of Kang the Conqueror) arriving via his high-tech Sphinx ship to assert ultimate domain over Egypt, setting up an explosive, multi-generational war for the soul of the timeline.
The new red and black suit sports a clearly defined DD logo and while it doesn’t seem to be a direct adaptation of any particular suit from the comics, it does have some shares aesthetics with the armored variant the character first wore in Daredevil #321.
With little to go on in terms of bread crumbs about the new season’s plot, it’s unclear how Matt–whose identity as Daredevil is no longer a secret–makes his way out of prison, much less resumes his work as a vigilante by night. But it is clear that he’ll look good doing it.
The grueling waiting game for mutant supremacy is finally coming to an end. With X-Men ’97 Season 2 officially locked to kick off its highly anticipated 9-episode run on Disney+ next Wednesday, July 1, 2026, fans have spent over two years worrying about how long they might have to wait for subsequent installments.
According to a report published by Deadline, those fears can officially be put to rest. Legendary series producer Larry Houston has confirmed that the painful, multi-year production delay that plagued the gap between the first two seasons was an isolated fluke, promising a much faster, regular release rhythm for Season 3 and Season 4 moving forward.
The two-year gap between the critically adored 2024 premiere season and this summer’s sophomore outing was heavily disrupted by backstage overhauls—most notably the abrupt, high-profile firing of former head writer Beau DeMayo just days before the series initially debuted. Because Marvel Animation had to actively restructure its creative pipeline, production on Season 2 faced significant logistical bottlenecks. Speaking on the streamlined adjustments behind the scenes, Houston provided a yet another highly reassuring update to the community.
“Luckily, the production problems won’t occur again,” Houston shared with Deadline. “There was a huge gap of time between [season] one and two. They’ve learned their lessons, so with [seasons] three and four, that won’t happen again. That was a one-off.”
Previously, Houston explained that under the watch of Marvel’s streaming skipper, Brad Winderbaum, fans would only have to wait “a year now between seasons, not two-and-a-quarter years,” promising that “It’s gonna be a year until the next one and a year until the next one [after that]. They are on schedule now.” Winderbaum has long expressed his belief that fans would respond well to Marvel Television and Marvel Animation series hitting D+ “on an annual cadence.”
With the backstage turbulence firmly in the rearview mirror, Marvel Studios Animation has quietly attempted to achieve a highly efficient workflow under new series writer Matthew Chauncey (What If…?). Rather than waiting for the public to digest the upcoming season, the studio is already deep in active visual production on Season 3. Simultaneously, narrative architecture and early storyboarding for a newly confirmed Season 4 are already moving down the assembly line in parallel. By treating the ongoing narrative as a continuous, flowing pipeline, Marvel is aiming to establish a highly dependable, yearly release schedule for its premier animated franchise.
In the meantime, the 9-episode Season 2 begins on Wednesday, July 1, 2026, with a massive three-episode premiere block tracking the team scattered across the ancient past, present, and a distant future. Early critical feedback out of the Tribeca Festival has already handed the season a perfect 100% on Rotten Tomatoes.
The animated corner of James Gunn and Peter Safran’s DCU Chapter 1: Gods and Monsters isn’t slowing down. During the World’s Finest panel at Annecy, showrunner Dean Lorey and DC Studios co-chair James Gunn have officially unveiled first-look details and artwork for Creature Commandos Season 2.
Season 2 will continue to follow the core team of monstrous metahumans originally assembled by Amanda Waller (Viola Davis) and John Economos (Steve Agee). The first-look assets confirm the survival and return of the central Task Force M mainstays:
David Harbour’s Eric Frankenstein and Indira Varma’s The Bride continuing their complicated domestic dynamic, with the latter leading the squad.
Alan Tudyk’s combustible Dr. Phosphorus, Sean Gunn’s Weasel, and the rebuilt military-bot G.I. Robot will also return.
“He’s got a really strong and emotional character arc this season,” producer Rick Morales said of G.I. Robot. “[Gunn] cares a lot and has really great insights. We sent him a dozen looks and keyed in on these rounder, bigger shapes.”
Who killed the Batman? That’s the multi-million dollar question sweeping through Gotham City, and nobody is angrier about the answers than the Clown Prince of Crime himself. During its blockbuster World’s Finest showcase at the Annecy International Animation Film Festival, DC Studios and Warner Bros. Animation officially gave a full-series greenlight to Joker: Laugh Riot—the first-ever official anime series in DC history.
Developed as a high-octane adult animated series, the project is a joint structural powerhouse co-produced alongside SOLA Entertainment, the acclaimed studio behind The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim.
While past projects like Suicide Squad Isekai or Batman Ninja dipped their toes into anime aesthetics, Laugh Riot is a fundamentally different beast—functioning as a dark, psychological underworld thriller. The series kicks off with a paradigm-shifting inciting incident: Batman has been murdered. Rather than celebrating the permanent vacancy of Gotham’s protector, the Joker is left completely hollow, unmotivated, and deeply offended that someone else stole his ultimate life’s goal.
When Batman is murdered, the Joker launches a ruthless crusade through Gotham’s underworld to find the killer who took away his greatest adversary. But as his violent quest for answers pushes him closer towards vigilante than villain, Joker is forced to confront the truth that without Batman, he doesn’t know who he is.
-Official synopsis for Joker: Laugh Riot
To capture the distinct, hyper-stylized kineticism of high-end anime, Warner Bros. has assembled a highly pedegreed creative pipeline:
Yasuhiro Aoki (ChaO) will direct. Aoki is no stranger to the streets of Gotham, having previously helmed the highly praised “In Darkness Dwells” segment of the 2008 anthology feature Batman: Gotham Knight.
Longtime DC animation veteran Jim Krieg (Batman: Knightfall) is locked in to guide the macro-narrative as executive producer.
Billed strictly as an adult animated series, Laugh Riot will feature an uncompromising look at the visceral, street-level brutality of Gotham’s mob landscape, tracking a manic, grief-stricken Joker playing a psychotic game of detective. The concept of a depressed, unhinged Joker hunting down Batman’s killer is an absolute goldmine of a narrative. It explores the toxic, co-dependent psychological relationship between the two icons on a level live-action movies rarely have the runtime to breathe through. By handing the animation reins to Aoki and SOLA Entertainment, DC isn’t just making a Western cartoon dressed up like anime—they are crafting a legitimate, uncompromised piece of Japanese animation that treats the Clown Prince of Crime like an unstoppable, John Wick-style force of underworld nature.
While a network or streaming platform has yet to be finalized, the project is moving ahead rapidly. By embracing adult anime as a primary pillar of their storytelling, DC Studios is tapping into the fastest-growing demographic in modern entertainment. If Joker: Laugh Riot hits the mark, it opens up a frictionless backdoor for future international partnerships—paving the way for high-end, dark fantasy anime epics.
One of the biggest publishing phenomenon in modern comic book history is officially making the jump to the screen. During a blockbuster joint presentation at the Annecy International Animation Film Festival today, Warner Bros. Animation and DC Studios blew the doors off the auditorium by announcing that an Absolute Batman adult animated series is actively in development.
In a massive win for creative continuity, Scott Snyder—the superstar writer who launched the comic line to unprecedented heights—will serve as the executive producer and showrunner. Nick Dragotta, the co-creator and artist behind the book’s signature hyper-kinetic look, is also locked in as a producer.
With the comic line having already smashed records by selling over 6 million copies (with Issue #1 hitting an incredible 11th printing), this adaptation is the ultimate no-brainer. But for casual fans wondering why the internet is losing its mind over a 7-foot-tall Caped Crusader, here is why Absolute Batman has broken containment—and how it fundamentally rewrites the rules of the Dark Knight.
The Absolute Difference: The Anti-Billionaire
The core thesis of the Absolute Universe imprint is a simple, terrifying question: What happens when you strip Earth’s greatest heroes of all their structural advantages?
While traditional, mainline Bruce Wayne is a multi-generational billionaire ninja backed by unlimited WayneTech resources, an untouchable mansion, and a loyal butler, the Absolute version is a complete, working-class inversion:
No Manor, No Money: This 24-year-old Bruce Wayne grew up in Crime Alley without a dime to his name. His father Thomas was killed in a mass shooting at the Gotham Zoo, his mother Martha is still alive (maybe), and he works by day as a blue-collar civil engineer.
The Scrap-Metal Arsenal: He doesn’t have high-tech bat-wings or military-grade satellites. He built his suit from scratch. His cape isn’t a glider—it’s a weighted, articulated set of hooks used to scale buildings and whip enemies like a weapon.
The Battle-Axe Logo: In perhaps the most metal design choice of the decade, the massive, blocky Bat-symbol on his chest isn’t just a logo—he literally rips it off his armor to use as a double-headed battle-axe in close-quarters combat.
Reimagining the Rogues
Because Bruce didn’t spend his youth traveling the world training with league assassins, his relationship to Gotham’s underworld is deeply personal. In this universe, classic Batman characters like Selina Kyle, Waylon Jones (Killer Croc), Harvey Dent, and Eddie Nygma are framed around a revisionist childhood dynamic.
The power balance is also entirely flipped. The world they face is defined by systemic corruption, wealth, and unchecked power. Adversaries are monstrous, nightmarish entities spawned by a fallen environment—meaning Bruce has to rely entirely on his raw human determination and massive physical size to push back against impossible odds.
Snyder has explicitly stated his goal was to create a Batman who faces the exact real-world anxieties about wealth, power, and corruption that a new generation does. Instead of maintaining a comfortable 80-year-old status quo, Absolute Batman moves with the frantic, high-stakes momentum of a modern prestige manga. It’s a mission to prove that even when stripped of every advantage, one good person can still change the world.
For decades, the fantasy of a billionaire using infinite resources to wage a private war on crime felt untouchable. But today, a working-class kid swinging an axe at the foundations of an unjust system resonates on a completely different emotional frequency. By putting Scott Snyder directly in the driver’s seat as executive producer and showrunner, DC Studios and Warner Bros. Animation are ensuring that this animated adaptation will retain every ounce of the raw, uncompromised, and utterly brutal vision that made the comic a historic success.
Cookie Consent
We use cookies to improve your experience on our site. By using our site, you consent to cookies.
This website uses cookies
Websites store cookies to enhance functionality and personalise your experience. You can manage your preferences, but blocking some cookies may impact site performance and services.
Essential cookies enable basic functions and are necessary for the proper function of the website.
Name
Description
Duration
Cookie Preferences
This cookie is used to store the user's cookie consent preferences.
30 days
These cookies are needed for adding comments on this website.
Name
Description
Duration
comment_author_email
Used to track the user across multiple sessions.
Session
comment_author_url
Used to track the user across multiple sessions.
Session
comment_author
Used to track the user across multiple sessions.
Session
Statistics cookies collect information anonymously. This information helps us understand how visitors use our website.
Google Analytics is a powerful tool that tracks and analyzes website traffic for informed marketing decisions.
Contains information related to marketing campaigns of the user. These are shared with Google AdWords / Google Ads when the Google Ads and Google Analytics accounts are linked together.
90 days
__utma
ID used to identify users and sessions
2 years after last activity
__utmt
Used to monitor number of Google Analytics server requests
10 minutes
__utmb
Used to distinguish new sessions and visits. This cookie is set when the GA.js javascript library is loaded and there is no existing __utmb cookie. The cookie is updated every time data is sent to the Google Analytics server.
30 minutes after last activity
__utmc
Used only with old Urchin versions of Google Analytics and not with GA.js. Was used to distinguish between new sessions and visits at the end of a session.
End of session (browser)
__utmz
Contains information about the traffic source or campaign that directed user to the website. The cookie is set when the GA.js javascript is loaded and updated when data is sent to the Google Anaytics server
6 months after last activity
__utmv
Contains custom information set by the web developer via the _setCustomVar method in Google Analytics. This cookie is updated every time new data is sent to the Google Analytics server.
2 years after last activity
__utmx
Used to determine whether a user is included in an A / B or Multivariate test.
18 months
_ga
ID used to identify users
2 years
_gali
Used by Google Analytics to determine which links on a page are being clicked
30 seconds
_ga_
ID used to identify users
2 years
_gid
ID used to identify users for 24 hours after last activity
24 hours
_gat
Used to monitor number of Google Analytics server requests when using Google Tag Manager
1 minute
Marketing cookies are used to follow visitors to websites. The intention is to show ads that are relevant and engaging to the individual user.
Pinterest Tag is a web analytics service that tracks and reports website traffic.
