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In case you missed it, there's a new Red Band series on the horizon from Marvel Comics called Marvel Zombies: Red Band. Exciting, right? Just don't expect to read Marvel Zombies: Red Band, its other Red Band brethren, or MAX series on Marvel Unlimited any time soon. For the foreseeable future, Marvel's mature titles will only be available in physical form at your local comic shop. Marvel Comics executive editor (and senior VP of publishing) Tom Brevoort explained in his Substack newsletter that the publisher has no plans for bringing books like Marvel Zombies: Red Band, Werewolf By Night: Red Band, and many more to its digital streaming platform.

Brevoort wrote, "The problem that we have with including MAX and Red Band books on Marvel Unlimited... is that there doesn’t seem to be any easy way to keep them out of the hands of younger readers who are perhaps not yet ready for their contents. Since that platform functions as an open digital library, every subscriber has access to all of it. It’s a problem that we haven’t licked—so for the moment, we refrain from including our most hardest-edged material there."

It's worth noting that DC Universe Infinite from DC Comics has plenty of its mature titles available to read online, with its own form of parental controls in place. In your user settings on DC Universe Infinite, you can set "content viewership alerts" where you will be notified via email if content rated above whatever you're comfortable with (12+, 15+, 17+) is accessed through your account. So in essence, if you select to get a content viewership alert for books rated 17+, and someone on your account reads, say, Mike Carey and Peter Gross's The Dollhouse Family, you'll get an email notification saying that that happened. 

The lack of Red Band and MAX titles on Marvel Unlimited also reads to some as a way to encourage fans to buy books from their local comic shop, which I get. However, not everyone has a local comic shop or feels comfortable bringing mature material into their homes. I don't have kids, but if I ever do, I know I'm going to have to put all 14 of my Berserk deluxe edition volumes someplace high out of reach, for instance. 

This is just my two cents, but we're far enough into the 21st century to know that parents should be aware of their children's browsing habits and screen time, and lay down basic ground rules. But what do I know, I'm just a millennial who read Stephen King at the library as a kid. Hopefully, Marvel Unlimited can come up with their own parental controls system. 

Get ready for what's next with our guide to upcoming comics, how to buy comics at a comic shop, and our guide to Free Comic Book Day 2025.