CANCELPOCALYPSE! DC Officially Cancels CAPTAIN ATOM, VOODOO, RESURRECTION MAN (Plus JUSTICE LEAGUE INTERNATIONAL)

Today, with the release of their September solicitations, DC Comics has confirmed that the following books are being canceled with their zero issues:

  • Captain Atom
  • Voodoo
  • Resurrection Man

These books join Justice League International, which had previously been announced as cancelled with issue twelve.

None of these cancellations are particularly surprising as all were at or near the bottom of the DC sales charts. When The New 52 was first announced, DC brass said that they would be very quick to pull low selling books and keep the line fluid. As much as I am sad, to varying degrees, for all of these books ending, I can respect that they are sticking to their guns and making a commitment to finding books that resonate with the audience.

Comments

  1. I really liked the concept of Resurrection Man but the story was just not interesting.

    • I read the first issue and the crossover with Suicide Squad and didn’t really care for either of them. That storyline brought Suicide Squad down.

      But I’m sure he’ll be back someday – that’s what he does.

    • I have been sticking with it, telling myself there was going to be a big payoff, but I was getting tired of he way he was getting haphazardly killed each issue, it wasn’t making sense.

    • I was really enjoying it. I loved the concept and went back to read the original series when I heard they were restarting it. I’ll miss this book!

  2. Voodoo died when Ron Marz left and the title was turned into another generic title. Sucks for Captain Atom though.

    • Agree completely… I’m still reading Voodoo but not enjoying it. Captain Atom, however, is so different from every other book I’m reading. Hope some interesting titles take their places.

    • So much yes. I kept reading Voodoo in the vain hopes it would get better (and also for Basri’s art, often), but since Marz left usually each issue was followed by me crying in a corner about how bad the story was.

  3. Sad. I like Voodoo. I hope she finds her way into Grifter or fingers crossed a Wild C.A.T.S. book.

  4. Sad to see Resurrection Man go…maybe he’ll show up in JL Dark.

  5. Sami Basri better get a new book soon…

  6. “Plus Justice League…” *mini-heart attack* “International.” Oh.

  7. The only title I’ll miss is JLI. Can Dan Jurgens go do Booster Gold again now? That was getting rather good.

    Also, Scott Lobdell on Superman? I guess.

    • Yeah, sad about JLI also. I was so excited at the end of JL:GL 24, when JLI was announced. The title has been hit and miss, but I would love for Jurgens to do a Booster series.

    • I am another that read JLI only for Booster Gold.

    • You know, the problem with all four of these books was simple to identify: VOODOO has lacked a through line in the story since Ron Marz was kicked off. RESURRECTION MAN didn’t have consistent internal art or a purpose to the story from the start. CAPTAIN ATOM could have been saved by a new writer being assigned because the book was pretty not engaging at all. And JLI didn’t work BECAUSE of Dan Jurgen not inspire of him. Those of us who had enjoyed the Justice League: Generation Lost title wanted a story crafted as well as the one written by Judd Winick. That was not this book. It was as good as most of Dan Jurgen’s work is, which was the problem! Batman didn’t need to be in it. Guy didn’t need to be in it.

      The running theme through all of these books was poor or uninteresting writing. Maybe DC needs to address that before they replace these titles with stuff that doesn’t work any better. I appreciate the fact that they are willing to kill poor selling books, I just wished DC didn’t put them out in the first place.

  8. I was reading any of these but it’s always sad when titles get cancelled. Feel bad for whoever really liked these. Hope they find some good replacements in the titles launching in September.

  9. Avatar photo Arrrggghhh (@Arrrggghhh) says:

    I dropped Captain Atom with #3 – just didn’t get how he was different than Firestorm anymore.
    VooDoo was good, but she needs to be in a team book.

    Resurrection Man was the best of this grouping, but I felt like the original arc was simply dropped around issue #7.
    How is this title really any different from Dial H for Hero? Just i know he dies, and that kinda starts getting old after awhile.

    • I waited until around issue five to drop Captain Atom for pretty much the same reason as you. But I am a big fan of Resurrection Man. Maybe I’m just sadistic though!

  10. Say what you will about the story, but Captain Atom was one of the best looking books on the shelves. No fill-ins, no delays (at least, I don’t recall any) and just consistently gorgeous. And not a small amount of that credit goes to the colorist, Jose Villarubia. Those vivid blues knock me out.

  11. So O.M.A.C.’s book gets canned and he seems to find a new home in JLI. Then that book kicks the bucket. O.M.A.C. can just not catch a break. I for one will miss JLI. For me, it was a fun read every month. Oh well, that’s life.

  12. On one hand, Resurrection Man was one of the few DC books that hooked me. On the other hand, I do love the “Cancelpocalypse” tag in spite of myself.

    This, I will take as an opportunity to try something I abandoned early or haven’t read yet.

  13. I noticed that Judd Winick is writing the #0 issue for Green Arrow. Does anyone know if that’s a one-time thing or if he’s taking over?

  14. VOODOO and RESURRECTION MAN were two of my New 52 favorites for the first couple months. After their first arcs, the quality on both took a massive nosedive.

    • To clarify, the quality of the storyline took the nosedive. I still enjoyed the art on both.

    • 100% agree with you. I was in the same boat. RESURRECTION MAN has its moments still, but seems to lack direction. VOODOO just…holy crap Williamson (or, I suppose, whoever was really calling the shots with its plot post-Marz) just destroyed everything that was good about that book. Some days I just stare off into the distance and imagine how awesome VOODOO might’ve been if Marz had been allowed to write more than four issues.

    • Agree! Both titles were missed opportunities. Each had fantastic starts and were pushed into the abyss by poor editorial decisions by management.

  15. I’m losing two books here. I’m not too sad either. JLI was good, but I don’t like that they’ve taken half the team out of commission (and they killed Rocket Red, who I was starting to like). Resurrection Man was so much better in the first volume, and I just cannot fathom why this one is so subpar.

    • I second the part about JLI. It seems several series have stumbled after the first arc, and after the last issue of JLI, I was left with some doubts about where the storyline would go

  16. But GRIFTER continues? It’s friggin terrible!

    • I just got the opportunity to check the sales chart, and Grifter sells less than Resurrection man, it ‘s over due for it’s cancellation queue.

  17. They going to group any of these into trades?

  18. Not shocked about any of these. I never made it past issue #1 on all of them.

  19. RIP Resurrection Man, the last non-LoSH ongoing New 52 series I was reading. Way to go DC, cancelling everything I actually want to read.

    • Don’t blame DC for canceling books that don’t sell and aren’t profitable. If you want to aim your blame, do at comic book readers that don’t support those books.

  20. VOODOO’s cancellation was truly a mercy killing. Everything great that Marz set up in his first issue was quickly scuttled off when he left. Glad that the generic mess that was left behind is being thrown out for books with potential.

    • I agree completely. It was so good, and it went to boring really fast. From the first page of issue 5, actually. Sad. I don’t know if keeping Marz on would have kept it from being cancelled, but it would have kept me from dropping it.

  21. Noooooooo not Captain Atom !!!

  22. Is there a reason Abnett and Lanning are not taking over Legion Lost? Now that would be awesome

  23. All the people sad about Marz getting kicked off Voodoo should check out his new book Prophecy.

  24. JLI is not a wise cancellation, just needed to fix the line up a little and maybe bring back the humor. Capt. Atom should end with the death of this Capt. Atom and the return of the original who is much better! Voodoo is such a good title and I myself can not see how this was just not well recieved?! Resurrection Man just really never got off the ground from issue one on and now one the very last two issues it is starting to have some intrest. OH well!!

    K

  25. So far I’ve lucked out with these cancellations. All the books that got dropped the first time and this time I had either stopped reading, or never read in the first place – except for JLI, which I probably would have dropped if I didn’t know it was ending soon anyway.

    There are some lower selling books that I DO NOT want to see cancelled, like Demon Knights and Legion Lost, but I know everything ends someday. Just not today!

  26. Any word on where this leaves Jesus Saiz? He’s sadly missed from Birds Of Prey.

  27. The 0 issues might have helped garner interest in the characters/titles. But alas ….

  28. Um. Can we cancel them all and try again with another 52… or how abut 26 really good ones to start.

  29. I like it. Still so many characters that can be reintroduced or flushed out. I would love if they would just commit a percentage of the 52 to high end minis with top talent. It doesn’t have to be profound, just new and interesting.

  30. JLI……seriously?!?! DC is keeping Grifter, JL Dark, Teen Titans, and cancelling this book? Messed up!!

    • JL Dark 9 was good with Lemire at the helm.

    • I think JL Dark has been good every issue.

      Teen Titans is a little off. A bit too 90s.

      JLI has been about as average as can be.

    • I also thought Lemire did an outstanding job on JLD, and look forward to where he takes that series.

      Meanwhile, Teen Titans is probably such a recognizable name in the line that it isn’t going to be canceled no matter what. Kinda like Green Arrow, which is so much worse.

  31. So what soon to be cancelled project will DC shuttle JT Krul off to next?

  32. Apparently I chose the right books to read. Static Shock was the only book that I was reading monthly that got canceled. Though I would have thought JLI would’ve been more popular.

    • JLI, as a concept and as a book with a long history, makes theoritical sense. But history doesn’t seem to be playing into DC’s decisions here. What IS behind their thinking, we may never know.

  33. Luckily I don’t read any of these books. I stopped Voodoo at issue 7.
    Tried Resurection Man but didn’t really like it. And never even tried Captain Atom.

  34. Not surprised on any of these being cancelled. More on how Captain Atom lasted even this long….Krul must have some dirt on Didio.

    Speaking of dirt, how the fuck does Liefeld have all three of his books STILL in publication? How is that possible?

    • Liefeld took one issue to ruin Deathstroke for me.

    • I thought Deathstroke was funny in a sad kind of way. Rob was trying WAY too hard in his writing to be cool. And thus he failed.

      His lazy art didn’t help, either. But it’s not like I was reading Deathstroke anyway, gave up after the first issue.

      But I’m sure the terrible sales numbers will eventually make DC realize they are making a big mistake thinking Liefeld is still a superstar artist, right?

  35. I give DC credit for being aggresive. Instead of allowing books with low numbers to languish at the bottom, they’re moving forward with new ideas. If the goal was to keep the DCNU fresh, this is one way to do it. The argument could be made that with the right creators, these books COULD be brought into the light , so to speak, but that would mean focusing time and attention on sinking ships. To change creators on major titles, like Superman, makes sense, but these 2nd and 3rd tier books may not warrent that kind of devotion.

    • *warrant*. Some day, we’ll all see an edit button for posts, and that day will be glorious…

    • haha, too true.

      Hopefully on that day they too will implement refreshing the page to the page you were reading when you clicked “Log In”, instead of redirecting you to the home page.

  36. I was still pulling rez man but it really isn’t nearly as cool as it could have been, they could have done cool things with heaven and hell instead it is like hey it is the body doubles for the fifth time.

    • More issues with the Body Doubles means more excuses for pantie-shots.

    • They were the only reason I picked up the first issue in the first place! But still, sexy ladies were not enough to win my love, nor that of the comic buying public. Alas and alack.

  37. I would have purchased JLI if it wouldn’t have had Batman in it. Too many issues relaunched staring Batman. All I wanted was a solid Booster Gold series.

  38. They could’ve definitely took JLI somewhere good with the right creative team, especially after bringing Omac over there, they could’ve dropped a cpl so-so characters and brought in a cpl more dynamic ones, hell drop Captain atom and Firestom then put em in JLI, Voodoo too.

  39. The only one of those I was pulling was JLI and I’m not upset it’s getting cancelled. It was a fun read, but I’ll just try out something else in its place.

  40. Avatar photo consafo80 (@consafo80) says:

    sad that JLI was canceled really liked it. although I’m looking forward to seeing how it all ends in the annual in a rumor I’ve just invented I great they go to earth 2 to help fight the big bad there. But seriously I was going they might of bought in Max Lord and Booster could of got closure for him killing Ted.

  41. I’m sad to see JLI go, but the book lost its way after the first story and just became a book for lost souls. Hopefully, they can will bring it back in a year or two with some more focus. The plus side is maybe Booster will end up in Blue Beetle and i’ll finally get my Blue and Gold team up. 🙂

    Maybe lanter4life is right these cancelation will just lead to a Wild C.A.T.S book. Vodoo, Grifter, Resurrection Man, ???

  42. I’m not too worried about the Resurrection Man cancellation. It’ll just be back in October, but with new powers.

  43. I rather liked Resurrection Man and thought it was well done, one of the better 52 titles.

    Now 10 months into the new 52 Universe, the quality of almost all the titles has taken a hit. Although I understand the business decisions that led to the reboot, there were a much larger percentage of better titles before the reboot.
    These titles’ cancellation of course reflect poor sales at least on a relative basis. Is there a way of comparing sales of titles now with those before the reboot? I’d be particulary interested in how Flash and Wonder Woman are selling as compared to there pre-52 versions.

  44. I fully expect: 1: a new Justice League book to launch in the bext six months, lemire has talked about a crossover he and Johns were working on involving the *three* JL books. 2: Captain Atom to be on that team. 3: Resurrection Man to guest in Justice League Dark. Grifter to end in the next round of cancellations, and for he & Voodoo to join a new W.I.L.Dcats book.

  45. Aw… Hate to see Captain Atom go, it was a great title and character. Hopefully he appears in Justice League. Since JLI is ending they really should give Booster Gold his own title again.

  46. Dropped Voodoo a while back.

    Wasn’t getting any of the others.

    Slowly dropping most of my DC, except the Earth2 stuff.