SDCC ’19: Did DC Comics make all its announcements before the show?

So, it looks like the pre-San Diego barrage of DC Comics news is all that’s going to be announced this year by the publisher.

It’s only day two, but several of DC’s biggest panels have already passed…and nada. Well not nada entirely, but pretty close. The often-newsy DC’s Meet the Publisher panel happened Thursday morning without any new comics announcements, other than co-publisher Dan DiDio mentioning a developing effort to build a clear and official timeline for its superhero continuity (a revelation that seemed unplanned and impromptu, sparked as it was by an audience question).

Then on Thursday afternoon, Batman writer Tom King’s spotlight went much the same way, even after he brought out friend and frequent collaborator, artist Mitch Gerads. Gerads seems destined to join King on a new series soon, given the mass amount of critical success the duo have had on books like Sheriff of Babylon and Mister Miracle, and King has maybe even mentioned that such a book is coming on his Twitter (I’ve been running around San Diego for three days now and my memory, among other things, is diminished)…but nobody is ready to get specific just yet.

And on Friday morning, the DC Nation panel—which featured DiDio, Cecil Castelluci, Amanda Connor, Jimmy Palmiotti, Josh Williamson, and Greg Capullo—was mostly just an anecdote-heavy discussion of the current state of the DC superhero mainline. That panel, to be fair, is usually dominated by interactive conversation with the audience, so this wasn’t really a surprise.

Also to be fair, DC has rolled out a ton of new comics announcements pretty much like clockwork for the past week or so, announcing a range of cool stuff that includes Jeff Lemire working on Black Label books, DiDio himself and Shane Davis bringing back The Metal Men, Brian Azzarello and Emanuela Lupacchino bringing back a movie synergy friendly Birds of Prey, and (most exciting to me!) Warren Ellis and Bryan Hitch doing what will be in the latter’s words “a proper, big Batman story” called The Batman’s Grave.

I’m sure there’s a major advantage in terms of marketing to getting the word about comics projects out in a controlled manner before all the movie and TV stuff sucks the air out of the pop cultural conversation during the actual show. Marvel also seems likely to have a more dominant presence at the show this year in terms of news, what with a double punch on Saturday of the MCU film panel that seems all but certain to announce new movies, and Marvel’s Next Big Thing comics panel featuring incoming X-scribe, Jonathan Hickman. But still, there’s usually something announced at Comic-Con by DC.

And hey! There still might be.

But really, none of DC’s remaining panels seem likely to yield much. Later today we’ll be covering DC’s Horror Panel, and then Saturday we’ll be at panels about DC Black Label and Batman, followed by a final Sunday conversation panel with DiDio.