Freeform, the Disney-owned network formerly known as ABC Family, has joined in on the Marvel Cinematic Universe fun: Variety reports that they’ve just greenlit Marvel’s Cloak and Dagger for a straight-to-series order. This superhero love story will follow teen runaways Tandy Bowen (a.k.a. Dagger) and Tyrone Johnson (a.k.a. Cloak), as they discover new superpowers, form their unique partnership, and fall in love.
The synopsis in Variety’s report lays out the main points of the series and how they get their names:
The live-action interracial romance follows the duo, two teenagers from very different backgrounds, who find themselves burdened and awakened to newly acquired superpowers while falling in love—Tandy can emit light daggers and Tyrone has the ability to engulf others in darkness. They quickly learn they are better together than apart, but their feelings for each other make their already complicated world even more challenging.
Official comic book canon has it that the two were “burdened” with their powers when an unethical chemist snatched up the runaways and injected them with an experimental form of heroin to be used on homeless teens. While most of the test subjects perished, Tandy and Tyrone reacted very differently to the drug. Considering that this show is running on Freeform, the origin story (not to mention Dagger’s costume) might get toned down.
We’ve seen other superpowered Marvel characters team up on the big screen (The Avengers) and small (Jessica Jones and Luke Cage), but Cloak and Dagger are unique for the fact that they wholly rely on one another. Their relationship is symbiotic, described as a literal yin and yang: darkness and light. They’ve also popped up all over the Marvel comics universe, from Spider-Man to X-Men to The Runaways… so could a crossover with Netflix’s Defenders and/or the Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. be in the cards?
