Teen Titans To Relaunch in July From Will Pfeifer and Kenneth Rocafort

With DC Comics's Teen Titans -- written so far by Scott Lobdell since the launch of the New 52 -- ending in just over two weeks, the publisher today announced plans to relaunch the franchise under H-E-R-O writer Will Pfeifer. Lobdell will reportedly return to writing Red Hood and the Outlaws in June, which Pfeifer is currently writing. It's a title Lobdell was pushed off last year around this time to make room for James Tynion IV while Lobdell headed into a big Superman event. At Comic-Con last summer, Lobdell joked about wanting Red Hood and the Outlaws back. "I kind of felt like with the last two issues I had told a complete story, so that made it easier," he said of leaving the book. "It wasn't as if I was writing one day and then yanked away from the book. Somebody told me yesterday–they said 'The book was so you…' and so leaving a Superman or something, when the time comes, Superman existed before me and will exist after me. But Red Hood & the Outlaws was something that I created from scratch, so it's kind of like–Rodney Dangerfield used to say that when someone else tells your jokes it's like having someone else beat your kids. So I do miss the gang." Pfeifer and Rocafort's new Teen Titans cast includes Red Robin, Wonder Girl and Bunker -- who have been on the team since the series' first arc -- as well as Raven and Beast Boy. While Pfeifer says that's the whole team at the moment, "something is in the works" to expand the cast down the line. Meanwhile, it seems that Pfeifer's first instinct is to give the Titans something that's surprisingly rare for teen superheroes: A teen enemy. "The idea of an adult supervillain is dangerous because he or she has potentially devastating superpowers and knows how to use them to achieve their goals," Pfeifer told Newsarama. "They know what they can do, they know how to do it, and they know who's going to get hurt (or killed) in the process. But if you ask me, the idea of a young supervillain is even more dangerous, because kids, bless their hearts, rarely consider the consequences of their actions. It's just something you have to learn as you grow up. Trouble is, when you can blow up buildings with your mind or shoot fire from your eyes, those lessons can be deadly for anyone unlucky enough to get in the way." The series and characters will also tie into the events of The New 52: Futures End, according to Pfeifer.