I recently got an email from Travis Bickle, and although he was clearly "talkin' to me," I think it's best if I just pass along exactly what he said:

We certainly are in a heavy Booster dry spell right now, which is why I was pathetically exuberant upon finding the news I'm about to share. HBO just updated its streaming service to be called simply "Max" instead of "HBO Max" (really clever change), and with this came some slight adjustments to other aspects of the experience as well, including allowing HBO's userbase to more options for their avatars in-app. Now, a user's profile can be represented by none other than Booster Gold, utilizing his look from the JLU animated series. Previously the options were a lot more limited.

Just last week, Warner Bros. Discovery put out a press release announcing new avatars were coming to their retooled app. Booster was nowhere to be seen. I'm very glad to see that oversight has been corrected.

Thanks for the news, Travis, but don't stay up all night watching movies. Lack of sleep is bad for your mental health.

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Big announcement today about our favorite hero coming to HBO! Says the press release:

The story will center on Booster Gold, a washed-up athlete from the future who travels back to the present in hopes of becoming the greatest super hero of all time. Instead of chasing criminals, however, his main priority is chasing fame and money. But Booster Gold discovers that being a hero takes more than just a megawatt smile, and that the future doesn't happen without first protecting the present.

Oh, wait. Sorry. That one was from the press release from 2011 when Booster Gold was coming to SyFy. Obviously, that one never materialized. I'm sure this new one by *checks notes* James Gunn is totally better and will really happen this time.

Don't let my snark fool you. I'm pleased as punch that Booster might be finally coming to a... whatever screen it is you can watch HBO Max on. Tablet? Cell phone? That seems appropriate for Booster.

You can see for yourself Gunn's announcement of DCEU "Chapter 1: Gods and Monsters" — which one is Booster? God or monster? — on Youtube.com, and you can read a pretty good write-up about what all it entails on Variety.com. In both Gunn describes the upcoming Booster story as:

Booster Gold is one of comics really popular cult heroes. He is a fascinating guy. He is a loser from the future who uses future technology to come back to present day and become a superhero so that people will love him. It is basically a superhero story of Impostor Syndrome on an HBO Max series.

That does sound like an angle that HBO would want to tackle. And I don't disagree with that take on the character, although I might have worded it a little differently. Personally, I prefer how Booster's creator Dan Jurgens described his hero to Russ Burlingame at ComicBook.com:

With a character like Booster, who's more complex that many people realize, clarity is essential. Many writers have made the mistake of treating him like an idiot, which he most certainly isn't. It's just that his journey from problem to solution sometimes gets a bit tangled up, which is what happens to most of us in our own lives.

Heck, that might be the best, most succinct description of Booster Gold ever. Nobody gets him like Dan does.

If the ten different projects Gunn mentioned are released in order, it sounds like we shouldn't expect Booster Gold sooner than 2025. We've all got plenty of time to get excited.

Thanks to all who made sure I knew the news.

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CBR.com (yes, them again) alerts us that

"A new report suggests that a series based on Blue Beetle may be in development at HBO Max."

That has caused a lot of Internet DC and comics fan sites (you know the type) to speculate that Booster Gold must be appearing in this. Two things:

1) We don't even know if this rumor is true, and

2) No it doesn't.

While it would be nice to think that Blue and Gold will one day own the airwaves just as they own our hearts, there's no great reason to assume that Booster will have anything to do with a Jaime Reyes Blue Beetle project (which this undoubtedly is, assuming it really is in the works).

Therefore... we are still where we were the last time we heard a rumor that Booster Gold might be coming to a streaming service near us: that is, Booster Gold might be coming to a streaming service near us.

*shrug*

When DC wants us to know otherwise, they'll tell us.

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Early Saturday, Wired.com ran an article by Adam Rogers titled "The CW's Crisis on Infinite Earths Puts a Gen X Headlock on Superhero TV".

The article is mostly about the CW's upcoming crossover event between its DC-themed television shows, but as originally published, it contained the following passage:

Clearly superproducer Greg Berlanti and writer Marc Guggenheim, teenagers at the time Crisis came out, cared about all this. Their Arrowverse now occupies a significant number of hours on the CW's program grid, pulling stories from all across DC spacetime. And like our own universe, the wider Berlantiverse is expanding. Titans and Doom Patrol are on the streaming service DC Universe—based on DC books but, confusingly, outside Arrowverse continuity. Next year, TV will add Arrowverse shows with Superman, Stargirl, Booster Gold, and Green Lantern.

Did Wired break the news that Booster Gold is coming to the CW in 2020? Not so fast.

The article was later updated, changing the above to

Clearly superproducer Greg Berlanti and writer Marc Guggenheim, teenagers at the time Crisis came out, cared about all this. Their Arrowverse now occupies a significant number of hours on the CW's program grid, pulling stories from all across DC spacetime. And like our own universe, the wider Berlantiverse is expanding. Titans and Doom Patrol are on the streaming service DC Universe—based on DC books but, confusingly, outside Arrowverse continuity. Next year, TV will add Berlanti shows with Superman, Stargirl, and Green Lantern.

Hmm. Look who's missing from that revision.

The footnote for the article says it was "Updated to clarify that not all the upcoming DC comics-based shows will necessarily be Arrowverse shows." Which obliquely avoids saying anything about why references to Booster Gold were dropped.

So, is a Booster Gold television show coming or not?

I asked around to see if I could confirm any of this (as it relates to Booster) and was told not to trust any of it. Therefore, let's pretend none of this happened and just keep hoping for progress on the Booster Gold The Movie coming to HBO Max rumor that I rumormongered last month.

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I'm never one to spread rumors, but ever since news broke that Greg Berlanti and Zack Stentz were working on a Booster Gold movie, rumor is about all we've had to talk about.

The skinny from David James of WeGotThisCovered.com is that

"[S]ome upcoming DCEU movies may skip theaters and premiere on HBO Max. The big name we're hearing is that Booster Gold could be the first feature film release for the service."

In case you hadn't already heard, Warner Bros will jump into the greedy proprietary streaming service game in May 2020. The service will stream content from across Warner Bros properties, both pre-existing and newly created. Berlanti has already announced two DC-themed shows.

As a result of that announcement, it seems a safe bet that the days are numbered for Warner Bros' existing DC Universe streaming service. We already know that at least some of its content (specifically Doom Patrol) will be moving to HBO Max. Therefore, if a Booster Gold movie is ever going to happen, it seems logical to assume that will be showing up at HBO Max, too.

Of course, that's all speculation. Like I said: rumors are about all we have to talk about when it comes to Booster Gold: The Movie.

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