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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For what it’s worth???? It’s absolutely wrong to say a Ying about a person who was just murdered your just as much of a freak as the person this story is about
Meanwhile, Tom King can talk about how he tortured people while he was in W Bush’s CIA, while laughing about it, and he’s DC’s darling. The clip has circulated. And King often boasts that he helped plan the Iraq invasion which killed a million civilians. But that’s not promoting violence, I guess? Meanwhile, A writer who’s trans doesn’t mourn the death of a vicious transphobe, and DC nukes them. It’s a mask off moment for DC.
I think that’s unfair. First, she is speaking about someone who just died publicly and violently and specifically, not in a war. You can have someone be an asshole and speak about their past in the army but that’s literally what he did. He was involved in that and even if it’s fucked up it’s massively different from murder in broad daylight. This is still the death of someone who had a family and kids. Political ideologies aside. This is literally what people complained about when people made fun of George Floyd’s death but yet given the chance we engage in that same rhetoric?
was kirk also killed by a police officer for no reason?
let’s not ignore the specific circumstance to make the situation seem less different.
Floyd’s situation was a tragic circumstance that considering his prior rap sheet that he was allowed back in society at all.
remember, he was being detained by police over use of counterfeit bills. he struggled, and while they were detaining him he died. a toxicology report found fentanyl and meth in his system at the time of his death. the drugs were not the direct cause of death, it was the manner in which he was detained.
let’s compare that to Charlie Kirk. he was not a felon. he was not engaged in any illegal activity at the time of his death. he was engaged in the action of the 1st amendment right we all have. and someone deliberately killed him with plenty of planning. I am sure we will find that the person who took his life did so with very specific reasons.
the only comparable bit between George Floyd and Charlie Kirk is that the deaths were tragic. that’s where the similarity ends, and I hope you really consider your responses more carefully moving forward.
We are a dealer and have not received any emails from our distributor. We still can order all the issues. We have also checked the DC news posts and their website. They still have the artwork displayed and are promoting it. Not to say this will not change, but other than the comic book new sites, this is not showing up on any other outlets that I can locate.
Glad this psychotic troon’s book was cancelled. To be fair, most comics today are garbage. Maybe because most “creators” are garbage humans.
This freak definitely is.
Still far better human than CK
You think the people he killed didn’t have family members? You think there weren’t innocents killed? You’re just upset that white trash got killed and not brown people
Not unfair at all, US murdered many people, including those who had children, you just don’t care because they were brown and you care about what happened to CK because he was white
pretty clouded huh?. hope you can find Jesus, because you need him.