10 Years Later, DC Studios’ 89% RT Flop Is Now an Underrated Gem

DC's Arrowverse was the live-action comic universe that could. While most of the world's attention was on the MCU and the struggles of launching a DC live-action movie universe, the grounded Arrow launched a connected series of shows that would run for over a decade, with Flash and Supergirl opening the world up to more possibilities.

But it was the fourth series of the Arrowverse that was the riskiest. Legends of Tomorrow was not just the first superhero team series for the franchise; it was the first show to be a wholly original idea. And for the first two seasons, Legends of Tomorrow struggled to find its voice. But when it did, Legends of Tomorrow became a cult favorite. Which is why it's shocking DC Comics hasn't turned the show into a comic.

While Legends of Tomorrow started off as a pretty serious show focused on C-list heroes and villains who are brought together to save the future, those early years aren't what fans love about the show. It was with season three, when Arthur Darvill's Rip Hunter stepped back, and Caity Lotz's White Canary became team leader, that the show found its groove.

Suddenly, Legends of Tomorrow was made up of consistently weirder adventures, from saving a young Barack Obama from Grodd to fighting a demon by turning themselves into a giant stuffed toy.

And, for a lot of comics fans, the style of Legends of Tomorrow felt familiar. The way the series mixed team dynamics with action and humor was similar to the Keith Giffen and J.M. DeMatteis era of the Justice League. That run, which ran for 60 issues and spawned a spin-off and a quarterly series, still stands as one of the greatest Justice League runs of all time.

Legends of Tomorrow, while never directly copying what Giffen and DeMatteis did, captured the same energy. Which is why it is shocking that DC has never tried to take the show and turn it into a comic. Of course, Giffen and DeMatteis wouldn't be able to work on a Legends of Tomorrow series (Giffen sadly passed in 2025), but there are plenty of great creators who could bring Legends of Tomorrow to the comics.

While Legends of Tomorrow had a dedicated audience and received critical acclaim, it never reached the viewership heights of Arrow and Flash. And the industry knows that the readers it does have are less likely to pick up a book if the title isn't instantly recognizable. There's a reason Marvel and DC are so focused on specific characters or groups like Batman and the X-Men: because new or lesser-known characters have a harder time on the comic shop shelves.

With the beauty of Legends of Tomorrow being a team of B and C-list characters getting into trouble across time and space, the series wouldn't have a Superman or Batman character to help draw readers in. Still, the industry needs to try new things from time to time.

Sure, some of those new things will end up being NFL SuperPro, but every now and then something hits, and a new fan-favorite character or team is born. And those characters or teams that make it big? They're the comic book legends of tomorrow.