DC Comics has taken the rather shocking step of abruptly canceling its new Black Label Red Hood series after only one issue. The news came to retailers late on Wednesday night (September 10) that the publisher was cancelling all further orders for the series, including the previously solicited issues #2 and #3.
The mature readers series written by Gretchen Felker-Martin, with art by Jeff Spokes, was an in-continuity adventure taking place after the heavily delayed H2SH storyline running in Batman, by Jeph Loeb and Jim Lee, which found Jason Todd, aka the Red Hood, heading to New Orleans stand-in New Angelique, and getting embroiled in a supernatural murder mystery alongside The Huntress.
Per Popverse, retailers were told that, “DC Comics cancels existing orders for Red Hood #2 and Red Hood #3, and any orders for future issues of the series. DC Comics will credit retailers for all invoiced copies of Red Hood #1, inclusive of copies that may have already been sold.”
While one could speculate that the delay of H2SH led to the cancellation — the final two parts of that storyline are now planned for release on November 12, 2025, and January 28, 2026, respectively, after initially planning to finish by this past August — that doesn’t seem to be the case.
In a statement shared with Comic Book Club, DC Comics said, “At DC Comics, we place the highest value on our creators and community and affirm the right to peaceful, individual expression of personal viewpoints. Posts or public comments that can be viewed as promoting hostility or violence are inconsistent with DC’s standards of conduct.”
Felker-Martin has been consistently outspoken online, with her views well known for years. Her social media posts were known entities well before the Red Hood series was announced. But given the timing — the news story dropped at 1 am ET — posters on BlueSky have specifically pointed to her posts about the death of Charlie Kirk yesterday at Utah University. Felker-Martin’s account has been suspended since the posts, but screenshots shared by others show her posting three skeets referring to Kirk, in particular: “Thoughts and prayers you Nazi bitch,” with a follow-up of “Hope the bullet’s okay after touching Charlie Kirk.”
However, a third post may be the one that drew the attention of the right-wing posters who began to circulate and criticize Felker-Martin’s posts, mostly on X (formerly known as Twitter). In it, the writer states, “The job market is grim, but there’s a silver lining: Gavin Newsom needs a new co-host for his podcast.” This is in reference to the first episode of Newsom’s podcast, which found him sitting down with the Talking Points creator.
For what it’s worth, Felker-Martin is transgender. And Kirk frequently espoused anti-trans ideology, up until the moment he died. As reported in multiple outlets, at the time of his death, he was debating whether trans mass shooters are one of the biggest dangers to the United States. When asked by an attendee how many transgender mass shooters there have been in the past 10 years, Kirk answered “too many,” with the attendee clarifying there have been five. As for Newsom, the governor and Presidential candidate hopeful has also been public about his own negative trans views, and Felker-Martin (again, in posts from the banned BlueSky account) has been critical of him, as well.
However, it seems the issue stems from Felker-Martin’s long history of posting, which was a violation of DC’s social policy, not just this week’s posts about Kirk. Is it possible that the ones mentioned above were the breaking point? Perhaps, given the timing. As is, given Felker-Martin is banned from BlueSky, and DC isn’t sharing any further statements, for the moment, this is all we’ve got to go on.
This article has been updated to include further information about the cause of the cancellation.
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