Townsville is one step closer to returning to the screen: Variety reports that Donald Faison (Scrubs, Clueless) has been (rather brilliantly) cast as Professor Utonium in The CW’s upcoming live-action Powerpuff Girls series. It’s now just called Powerpuff, presumably because the girls are all grown up.
The professor—Drake to his friends—is a genius who created the trio of tiny crimefighters in his lab. In the cartoon, he’s the gentle but authoritative figure who makes sure the girls get a good night’s rest and eat their vegetables. But with the girls disbanded and in their twenties, Daddy Powerpuff is juggling a midlife crisis and a need to sort out his relationships with his disillusioned daughters.
Powerpuff stars Chloe Bennet (Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.) as the team leader, Blossom; Dove Cameron (also Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.) as the chipper Bubbles; and Yana Perrault (Broadway’s Jagged Little Pill) as the tough Buttercup. All we know about the plot is that the grown-up girls have broken up the trio, resentful about having spent their childhoods fighting crime. But some new trouble rises and the team has to figure out how to come together again (to save the world, of course).
This show could go in so many directions (and has so many villains to choose from). The pilot episode is written by writers/executive producers Heather Regnier and Diablo Cody, and directed by Maggie Kiley (Riverdale). Along with its many superpowered CW siblings, Powerpuff is executive produced by Berlanti Productions. Regnier’s name is often overshadowed by that of Oscar-winner Cody (Juno), but her TV production resume includes Sleepy Hollow, iZombie, and the last season of Veronica Mars. The elements seem to be in place for this to be a fun, smart show—so long as it doesn’t take itself too seriously or too ridiculously.
I really hope MojoJojo is the villain.
@1- I fear he may instead be one of the Powerpuff’s hot-but-troubled boyfriend.
I wonder if the Gangreen Gang will show up and if they will reference the fact that Ace joined the Gorillaz.
Now that I think about it, a lot of the adversaries are going to be a challenge to pull off in live action. HIM? Fuzzy Lumpkins? It will be interesting to see who makes the cut and how they turn out.
Maybe an appearance of the grown up Rowdyruff Boys?
He’s no superman, but Donald Faison will do d— well by The Good Professor!
“The elements seem to be in place for this to be a fun, smart show—so long as it doesn’t take itself too seriously or too ridiculously.”
I hope it leans more toward the ridiculous. I liked Riverdale at first, when it balanced the wholesome, optimistic goofiness of its source material with the dark, twisted storylines it told, but then it went too far toward the dark and twisted and wasn’t fun anymore. I want this to embrace the absurdity of the premise. A lot of people misunderstand that PPG was always satirical and subversive, a show about adorable preschooler superheroines inflicting exaggerated ultraviolence on their foes and causing enormous property damage in their battles, so it doesn’t need to be changed much to have an adult edge.
I really only know Faison from his Hype Fazon character in Star Wars Resistance, whose personality was apparently based on Faison’s and was about as diametrically opposite to Professor Utonium as I can imagine. Of course, actors are capable of range, and casting directors know their business, so I won’t make assumptions.
I want to know who’s playing Miss Bellum, and if she’ll only be shot from the neck down. By this point, she’s probably the Mayor of Townsville. If not the governor.
@6. ChristopherLBennett: If they wanted to be really pertinent (and mischievous to boot) they could show Miss Vellum having gone on to be Vice President of the United States! (-;
@7/ED: It’s Miss Bellum. Sara Bellum. It’s a pun.