Just after the ‘M.O.D.O.K.’ casting announcement, here comes more Hulu animated series news. ‘Tigra & Dazzler’ was previously reported as getting an overhaul, but now it has been completely cancelled, along with Dave Willis and Kevin Smith’s ‘Howard the Duck.’
The behind the scenes personnel shake up of the TV division contributed to the killing of these two shows. ‘M.O.D.O.K.’ and ‘Hit-Monkey’ are still moving forward, but the planned ‘Offenders’ crossover special that was supposed to bring all four of solo shows together will not.
Kevin Smith took to Twitter to confirm the ‘Howard the Duck’ news himself:
Alas, Howard remains trapped in a world he never made. Thanks to #JephLoeb, @DaveWillis2 and the Best Duckin’ Writer’s Room for all the effort. May we all @Marvel meet again one day on something else! https://t.co/e05ad0zn1M
— KevinSmith (@ThatKevinSmith) January 25, 2020
Jeph Loeb was once in charge of the Marvel TV division, which is why there were only loose connections to the larger MCU. But Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige now oversees everything, so some projects will get lost in translation.
Howard the Duck was the subject of a 1986 Lucasfilm movie of the same name. He then went on to have cameos in both ‘Guardians of the Galaxy’ films, where the character was voiced by Seth Green. It is unknown who was going to voice Howard in the Hulu series.
While it is a bummer not to see Smith’s take on it, he is working on another property that will excite people. He is the writer and showrunner for Netflix’s ‘Masters of the Universe: Revelation’ miniseries.
Smith’s latest film, ‘Jay and Silent Bob Reboot,’ relaunched the View Askewniverse, so he is now working on sequels to other properties in that world. While the loss of ‘Howard the Duck’ is unfortunate, there is still plenty more from Smith coming down the pike.
As for ‘Tigra & Dazzler,’ the original showrunner, Erica Rivinoja, and writing staff were dismissed. There was never another showrunner assigned to the project before it became collateral damage too.
Hulu is still very much in the Marvel game however. As stated before, Patton Oswalt’s ‘M.O.D.O.K.’ is coming along nicely, and Josh Gordon and Will Speck’s ‘Hit-Monkey’ is still in development. On the live action side, ‘Helstrom’ is still happening, even though its counterpart, a live-action ‘Ghost Rider’ series, was also canned.
Between the projects moving forward at Hulu, and all of the stuff announced for Disney+, Marvel will still have a strong presence on the small screen in the future.
Jacob Tyler contributed to this article.