HBO Max Canceled Kevin Smith’s Upcoming TV Show

The animation industry was rocked by cancellations this summer, including some existing shows and some that were still in development. One that might have flown under the radar was a DC Comics adaptation involving filmmaker Kevin Smith called Strange Adventures. Smith explained how the show had been canceled during his podcast Hollywood Babble-On back in August.

Strange Adventures had been in the works since 2019, and was meant to be an anthology series that would have highlighted some of the more obscure heroes, villains and other characters in the DC universe in small, self-contained tales. According to a report by Screen Rant, each episode of the show would have “explore[d] close-ended morality tales about the intersecting lives of mortals and superhumans.” Smith was on board along with Arrowverse mastermind Greg Berlanti, but he says the whole project has been scrapped.

Smith was attached as an executive producer and a director on Strange Adventures, but even in his prolific podcasts, he has not shared any updates on the show since around the time of its announcement. He broke that silence on Aug. 6 when he revealed that he had been working on an episode with writer Eric Carrasco. He said that Carrasco was the one to inform him that the series was canceled.

“It feels like what was once, to me, a promising future of we are going to see a bunch of DC stuff on HBO Max; MORE DC stuff than we would see theatrically, including s- like Strange Adventures… gone!” Smith said. “All of it is just f-ing gone now. I got a call the other day from Eric before all of this story broke and he was just like ‘Strange Adventures is officially dead,’ and I was like ‘What the f-, are you serious?!’ I know we haven’t heard from them for a while, but I guess this goes in parts with the new moves with [Warner Bros. Discovery CEO] David Zaslav. But good lord, I thought Strange Adventures being a causality kind of made sense to me. Nobody necessarily knows these characters, it sounded like an expensive show.”

For what it’s worth, Smith revealed some details on the defunct show for fans that are interested in what they missed out on. His episode with Carrasco would have focused on the characters Jimmy Olsen and Perry White from The Daily Planet being abducted by Bizarro and taken to Bizarro World. Smith would have directed this episode, and he said that the producers were hoping to get Nicholas Cage to play Bizarro.

Smith’s references to Zaslav and other shakeups at Warner Bros. likely pertain to the many recent cancellations at HBO Max – particularly when it comes to DC Comics adaptations. Warner Bros. is changing strategies as it merges with Discovery Inc. and that seems to include a lot of cancellations for scripted shows and movies. The studio shocked fans earlier this month when it completely scrapped a Batgirl movie that was virtually finished.

Other DC projects still exist in a state of limbo, and besides Smith, no one else has made official comments on Strange Adventures in quite some time. Other DC Universe projects are available to stream right now on HBO Max.