Constantine

A few weeks ago, Matt Ryan was caught on video warning viewers that they only had a short amount of time to stream his cancelled NBC series ‘Constantine’ before it vanished from The CW Seed, where it had been available to binge in anticipation of his joining the Arrowverse full-time this fall on ‘Legends of Tomorrow’.  The CW Seed is also offering ‘Constantine: The Legend Continues’, an original animated series, featuring Ryan’s voice in the lead role.  But rest assured that the live action ‘Constantine’ series isn’t completely vanishing.  It’s simply moving over to the new DC Universe streaming service.

‘Constantine’ joins a pretty hefty library of shows based on various DC Comics characters, going all the way back to the 1940s with Max Fleischer ‘Superman’ animated shorts.  Also on tap are the 1950s ‘Adventures of Superman’, the 1970s ‘Wonder Woman’ starring Lynda Carter, ‘Superboy’, a low-budget syndicated show from the late 1980s, ‘Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman’ and the first ‘The Flash’ series, both from the ’90s and more.  ‘Constantine’ is, of course, based on the character John Constantine, who was featured in a bestselling comic series called ‘Hellblazer’ during the ’90s, which was published under DC’s adults-only Vertigo line.

Interestingly, the DC Universe original series slate is pretty Vertigo-heavy, as there are two other live-action series based on Vertigo books, ‘Doom Patrol’ and ‘Swamp Thing’, on the way.  Even though Ryan’s Constantine is firmly entrenched in The CW’s Arrowverse, his solo show will be the closest that DC Universe gets to it.  For the time being, ‘Arrow’, ‘The Flash’, ‘Legends of Tomorrow’, Supergirl’ and the disconnected ‘Black Lightning’ will remain on Netflix.

As for the character’s place in the Arrowverse, earlier this year, ‘Legends’ showrunner Phil Klemmer stated:

“I had not really realized the fervor of [Constantine’s] fandom.  I sort of accidentally discovered it. Honestly, we put him on the show just because we wanted him on the show. There’s no cynical calculation of trying to accumulate somebody else’s fans. I think we have fun with our characters. Having Tala Ashe on the show…she’s cool. If I just needed an adjective to describe her, she is a cool lady. I feel the same way about Constantine and Matt. We wanted just a counterpoint to our Legends….Personally, I can’t imagine Constantine having quarters on the Waverider. I want to keep him Constantine. I don’t want to ever have a scene of him having to do his laundry because to me, guys like Constantine, they always have clean clothes. Who knows where they come from? I don’t want to see that scene.”

Are you glad that ‘Constantine’ will have a new home?  Are you planning to subscribe to DC Universe?

DC Universe is available to pre-order before it launches on September 15th.  The price is $74.99/year or $7.99/month.