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He's back.

Virgil Hawkins.

Static.

At DC's Next Level panel during Comic-Con International: San Diego 2026, DC Comics announced that a new ongoing Static comic book series is underway by writer Cody Ziglar and artist Diego Olortegui. It's being created as part of the 'Next Level' initiative, a program to pair select creators with either underused characters or those that they have a dramatic new take on to give them — the creators and the characters — a chance to level up.

And for many of us of a certain age, Static is the hero of a generation.

”For a lot of us, [Static] was the first Black superhero that we ever saw," says Ziglar, who broke into comics by writing for the Marvel Studios' TV series She-Hulk: Attorney- at Law. “Static has been out of the public eye in this universe… [this new series is him] reintroducing himself., Static is back.'"

Ziglar refers to the fact that for most of Static's history, he has existed in a separate universe than DC"s mainline heroes in what's known as the Dakotaverse. While all of Static's comics to date have been published by DC, it's largely been set off to the side for what the late Dwayne McDuffie, co-creator of Static, says is because of the unique ownership of Static and all the Dakotaverse characters: DC doesn't own them. They've always been owned by Milestone Media, a company McDuffie co-founded in the early '90s that has licensed the characters to DC while retaining creative control on how they're used... and for unspecified reasons, according to McDuffie it has largely never been possible for DC and Milestone to agree on the character's usage in the main DCU.

But recently, something has changed. Static and some other Dakotaverse heroes were brought into the DCU recently with the sold out The New History of the DC Universe; The Dakota Incident one-shot, and it was recently announced that Static would join the New Titans title (and team roster). The announcement of this new ongoing Static series seems a furtherance of that, and a more collaborative relationship between DC and Static's owners, Milestone Media.

“I’m so excited to bring Static back ot the world at large," says Ziglar. 

Ziglar and Olortegui's Static series doesn't have a firm release date yet.

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