After the release of Batman V Superman and early indicators that the upcoming Wonder Woman film won’t be light in tone, DC Comics wants to let their fans know that they’re not all doom and gloom. That’s why earlier this year, they pitched the sitcom Powerless to NBC with Community’s Danny Pudi and Alan Tudyk of Firefly in supporting roles. According to Variety, NBC announced on Wednesday that they have ordered the series for the 2016-2017 fall season.
Powerless will star Vanessa Hudgens as Emily Locke, a young woman with a “spunky personality” and has what sounds like a mundane job as an insurance adjuster. However, she works for an agency that specializes in insuring regular folks whose lives have been turned upside down after accidents caused by superheroes during their crime fighting sprees. Pudi is in the role of Teddy, Emily’s best friend. Tudyk will be Del, the new manager at the company, and Christina Kirk is Jackie, Emily’s assistant. Powerless is a workplace comedy executive produced by Ben Queen and Michael Patrick Jann. Queen also wrote the pilot episode and Jann directed.
Here’s your first look at @VanessaHudgens (sort of) saving the day in #Powerless, coming soon to @NBC! pic.twitter.com/1ASM3TRbay
— Powerless (@NBCPowerless) May 12, 2016
Despite recent sitcom blunders, NBC has a pretty solid track record when it comes to workplace comedies. The Office, 30 Rock, and Parks and Recreation all easily reached syndication status. It’s much too early to tell how Powerless will do, but judging by how hot comic-based television and streaming programming is right now, The Peacock might have a hit on their hands.
NBC also announced that they picked up Trial & Error, a sitcom about a young lawyer from New York who moves to the South to defend an eccentric poetry professor played by John Lithgow who is accused of murdering his wife.
(Via Variety)