It would’ve been impossible for anyone to follow Marvel’s instant-classic San Diego Comic-Con showing last night, where the studio confirmed multiple new movies, announced that Natalie Portman is going to return as The Mighty Thor, and revealed that Mahershala freakin’ Ali is playing goddamn Blade, but that is just the unenviable position that DC Universe streaming service found itself in. Luckily, it at least did have some stuff to announce yesterday, even if we were all still buzzing from the Blade news to talk about it much yesterday. For one thing, there was a new trailer for Kaley Cuoco’s Harley Quinn cartoon, which you can find over here, but DC Universe also announced some new information about three of its biggest shows.
First off: Doom Patrol. The weirdo superhero series is not only getting a second season, but that second season will make its debut simultaneously on both DC Universe and WarnerMedia’s upcoming HBO Max service. Warner Bros. would never admit this, certainly, but it seems pretty obvious that this is going to be a test case to see which version—DC Universe or HBO Max—performs better. Maybe Doom Patrol won’t be deciding the fate of DC’s streaming future, but some executive is definitely going to pay attention to this. Season two of Doom Patrol will premiere in 2020.
Next: Titans. We already knew a second season was coming, with Iain Glenn joining the team as Bruce Wayne and Esai Morales playing famous teen-hating, one-eyed mercenary Deathstroke. We don’t know if that means they’ll be touching on iconic Teen Titans storyline The Judas Contract, but you don’t put Deathstroke near any of the Teen Titans without expecting someone to think of The Judas Contract. Anyway, the news is that season two of Titans will premiere on September 6.
Finally, we have Young Justice: Outsiders, DC Universe’s revival of the canceled-too-soon Cartoon Network series. That show will also be getting a new season, though we know slightly less about that one than Doom Patrol. It’s already in production, so it might not be too far off, but it doesn’t even have a premiere window yet. Also, the mere existence of these announcements implies that things aren’t as dire at DC Universe as some might have assumed, so at the very least it’ll outlive Seeso.