Marvel’s been doing pretty well for itself in the television world so far, but there’s one genre they haven’t tried out yet: the teen drama. All that’s about to change with Cloak & Dagger, a new 10-episode series for Freeform that’s got Joe Pokaski from Underground as showrunner and Jeff Loeb and Jim Chowry as executive producers.  Honestly, if this brand new trailer is any indication, they’ve completely nailed it.
Cloak and Dagger are relatively minor characters in the Marvel Comics canon, but completely perfect ones to build a YA-focused series around given that their background is chock full of drama. Two teen runaways from disparate backgrounds, Tandi Bowen and Tyrone “Ty” Johnson’s destinies become intertwined when they meet each other in New York City and are experimented on by a chemist attempting to create a new form of synthetic heroin. The drug causes them to develop complementary superpowers of light and darkness, and they join up to become a crimefighting duo with a special focus on helping other lost youths. Since their first appearance in an 1982 issue of The Spectacular Spider-Man they’ve also notably appeared in The New Mutants, Marvel Knights and Runaways, which is ironically also getting its own TV adaptation on Hulu sometime in the next year.
Already it seems like the Freeform series will deviate from the original source material a bit, giving its heroes powers based on a shared childhood rather than drugs. But the family turmoil, the street-level grittiness, and the undeniable chemistry between Olivia Holt and Aubrey Joseph? That’s all completely perfect, and I can’t wait to see how the series unfolds from here. Hear that, Pretty Little Liars? There’s officially a new game in town.
What do you think, Marvel fans? Will you be checking out this series when it comes to television in early 2018? Let us know in the comments!
Image: Freeform
