Meet the "new Nightwing" of DC Future State: Teen Titans - spoilers

DC has shared some images from January's Future State: Teen Titans #1 ahead of their virtual Justice League Family panel Friday afternoon, December 4 for Brazil's CCXP Worlds.

The new images include three interior pages from the issue (below), along with a promo image that raises more questions than it provides answers about the title ahead of the two-issue series's January 12 debut.

The first, as seen above and to the right is self-explanatory, albeit with unexplained implications.

According to the image, Red X, a character who like Harley Quinn was created for a DC animated TV series - in this case, the early '00s Teen Titans series - will make his comic book debut in Future State as the partner of the "new Nightwing" who appears to be wearing a Nightwing costume along with a variation of long-time Titans nemesis Deathstroke's mask.

Article continues below

On the surface, this may seem like the introduction of another new character or the new mystery identity of an existing character until you realize this "new Nightwing" is wearing the same Nightwing costume as Dick Grayson as seen on the covers of Future State: Teen Titans #1 and #2. In fact, Dick/Nightwing is seen reaching for the Deathstroke mask on the cover of issue #1.

But the intrigue doesn't end there. If you look closely, this "new Nightwing" is also packing a sidearm (not very Dick Grayson-like). But before you conclude that definitively makes it a new character, check out these three black and white pages by Rafa Sandoval from Future State: Teen Titans #1 that Newsarama readers get to see first, which includes who by all appearances is Dick, in the same costume, also packing the sidearm.

Image 1 of 3

The images also drop a few other specific information bombs about the future of Future State: Teen Titans.

The solicitation copy has already revealed the story takes place when some of the original New Teen Titans return to the ruins of Teen Titans Academy, a school formed to mentor young DC heroes (which has not yet been established in current DC continuity) to combat the villain who destroyed it years prior.

These new pages reveal who didn't make it out of that attack alive, including the grave markers of Donna Troy, Wally West, and Wallace West along with the names of a few characters that don't seem to have appeared yet in DC continuity - Summer Zahid, Matt Price, and Lucas LaPorte or LaPorter.

(Matt Price, interestingly and likely coincidently, was the name of the Dell Comics '60s superhero Brain Boy.)

In addition, a giant Roy Harper statue seems to indicate he also perished in the attack.

Future State: Teen Titans writer Tim Sheridan will be one of the featured creators for the CCXP Worlds Justice League Family panel, so perhaps some additional insight will be coming later Friday.

Check out all of DC’s Future State comic books here:

I'm not just the Newsarama founder and editor-in-chief, I'm also a reader. And that reference is just a little bit older than the beginning of my Newsarama journey. I founded what would become the comic book news site in 1996, and except for a brief sojourn at Marvel Comics as its marketing and communications manager in 2003, I've been writing about new comic book titles, creative changes, and occasionally offering my perspective on important industry events and developments for the 25 years since. Despite many changes to Newsarama, my passion for the medium of comic books and the characters makes the last quarter-century (it's crazy to see that in writing) time spent doing what I love most.