It's been 7 years, must be time for another Constantine show

What is it with John Constantine? What is it about DC Comics’ resident magic-slinging bad boy that drives the networks wild? Is it the smoking? The trench coats? The British words that sounds like curses but are probably just another word for “biscuits”? Why are we getting another damn Constantine show?

That’s right: Per Variety, HBO Max is reportedly moving forward on a new series about DC’s most trouble-making magus, in what we have to assume is part of an ongoing effort to challenge themselves to make a series that doesn’t make demons and smoking seem cool centered on a character whose entire aesthetic is “Hey, kids, smoking and playing with demons sure is cool!” This comes a mere 6 years after the cancellation of the last Constantine show, in which Matt Ryan attempted to make these same self-destructive quirks fly on NBC, which puts this particular reboot on, like, “Time to get a new Spider-Man” scheduling. The new show, apparently part of Warner Media’s ongoing efforts to diversify the offerings of its extremely far-flung DC Comics properties, will apparently be in the same universe as Man Of Steel et. al, and will tie into that hypothetical Justice League Dark series that’s been floating around under the aegis of J.J. Abrams at the streaming service since last April.

Stepping past the fact that there’s only so many times we can stand to hear people whisper about “the Newcastle incident” in a spooky voice—as is presumably de rigueur for any Constantine series—there’s also the rather awkward fact that Ryan hasn’t, like, stopped playing Constantine in the subsequent years, having transferred over to The CW’s Arrowverse, where his spin on everyone’s favorite grey-hearted, black-lunged sorcerer has been a semi-regular member of the Legends Of Tomorrow for several seasons at this point. Although, if we can have 8 million Jokers bouncing around, quoting Seinfeld at each other, maybe one more sexy bisexual wizard wouldn’t necessarily hurt.