Titans will be bringing a lot of changes in its third upcoming season, including where it’ll be airing as it moves from DC Universe to HBO Max. Since 2018, the Teen Titans live-action drama has been one of the darker shows to come out of DC TV as it reimagined the beloved franchise. Throughout their past two seasons, the team has expanded with various characters being brought in from the comics. The latest season also saw Dick Grayson finally take the last step to become Nightwing. The third season was originally supposed to arrive this fall, but due to the global pandemic, plans obviously changed.
But thanks to DC FanDome, viewers found out multiple exciting things that are coming in Titans season 3. Not only is Jason Todd going to become Red Hood, but the series will also see the introduction of Barbara Gordon and Scarecrow. The team will also re-locate as they’re leaving San Francisco for Gotham City. However, the biggest change to hit the series is that its third season will air on a new platform. With DC Universe becoming a comic service and HBO Max being WarnerMedia’s bigger priority, all of the original DC series is heading to the new platform, including Titans.
Currently, Titans are expected to return for season 3 sometime in the later part of 2021, with filming supposedly happening this fall. Given the resources being vastly different on DC Universe and HBO Max, it remains to be seen how different Titans might be when season 3 starts airing. Since the show has been a big focus for Warner Bros. TV, it’s not impossible that Titans' move to HBO Max might actually be incredibly benefiting. Besides the fact that it now has a stable home with HBO Max, being under a new distributor may allow Titans to change certain elements of how the show is made.
HBO Max Can Give Titans Longer Airtime
Since premiering on DC Universe, Titans has surprisingly not taken advantage of being a streaming series. Unlike the Arrowverse shows on The CW, Titans have the freedom to go beyond the regular 42-minute run that the broadcast shows go with. Their fellow spinoff series Doom Patrol has in both seasons gone beyond the 40-minute mark as they have episodes that have a length of over 50 minutes. But for unknown reasons, Titans never seemed to take the advantage of that in their first two seasons. Despite even having over 10 episodes, it has always felt like the writers had to cram in so much into every single episode when all they perhaps needed was longer airtime.
The last season introduction an overwhelming amount of arcs and characters from the war with Deathstroke, Project Cadmus to Starfire's feud with Blackfire. Given how large Titans has become at this point, if they're going with a 10-13 episode order, extending the air time for season 3 would benefit them tremendously. This is one of the biggest mythologies in DC Comics that comes with major heroes and villains as well as iconic arcs. Given that the live-action series is wanting to use it as much as possible, a 40-minute format simply won't do and hopefully, HBO Max will recognize that.
Titans Can Get A Proper Credits Sequence (Like Doom Patrol)
Something that can easily become iconic with a show is its opening credits, but given how the TV genre has evolved, some shows only use title cards instead. Due to commercial breaks, networks have pretty much phased out long opening credit sequences. While some of the Arrowverse shows have brought it back to a certain degree since Crisis on Infinite Earths, broadcast networks are mostly sticking to the short intros. However, the DC Universe originals have interestingly enough gone two ways with it. One of the most beloved aspects of Doom Patrol is its captivating introduction featuring a core element of each character while playing to their theme song.
But in the case of Titans, they have gone in the opposite direction by doing a short montage going past each letter in the show's title. Given that this is a Teen Titans-based series, it's disappointing that they wouldn't take a page out of Doom Patrol's book and create an iconic opening sequence. In one way or another, the theme song, as well as a credit sequence, becomes part of the series in the long-run. Looking at another comic book series, one of Smallville's most iconic aspects was their theme song that played during every opening sequence for 10 seasons. With HBO Max not having to worry about commercial breaks, there should absolutely be the space for Titans to finally revamp their intro.
Titans Could Have A Bigger Budget
While Titans certainly have impressive special effects, it's noticeable that their budget isn't as big as it probably should be. A majority of the characters are mostly humans while the team consists of a number of super-powered heroes. The first season became known for teasing Trigon as their first big bad, but only showed him in his human form in the final episodes. The Titans season 2 premiere had Trigon transform into his comic-accurate form, only to be defeated moments later by Raven which probably had to do with budget restrictions. While it's not confirmed, if a budget wasn't a concern then viewers would have gotten to see Trigon in his true form for more than an episode.
Then there is the case to be made about Beast Boy who is one of Titans' most underutilized characters that has shown his full potential when given the opportunity. His super-power is being able to shapeshift into any animal, but so far in the series, he has only changed into a handful of them. Even if it's plot-related, it's almost a given that it's due to their budget being restricted, or else he'd have shapeshifted into more animals by now. Whether or not it was because of DC Universe having limited resources is still an unanswered question. That could also probably explain why they choose to not make Beast Boy and Starfire have their skins be green and orange respectively all the time like in the comics.
But with the move to HBO Max, it's very possible that the production budget will be increased. Given that the new platform wants to make all of their original series look as visually good as possible, it's hard to imagine Titans not getting a boost. To up the visuals for the third season would also help with the transition from DC Universe to HBO Max while also being able to separate themselves from the DC digital service. It'd also help them for future seasons as the writers will likely introduce even more DC characters that require a good VFX budget. Based on how big HBO Max's commitment is going to be for Green Lantern and Justice League Dark, hopefully, they'll show the same dedication for Titans season 3 as it becomes part of their DC TV line-up.