If you thought ‘Arrow’ producer Greg Berlanti would be satisfied with four ongoing TV projects under his belt, you’ve got another thing coming! Berlanti has just landed a deal with Fox to produce a pilot for a ‘Black Lightning‘ series.
The pilot is set to be written by the husband and wife writing team of Mara Brock Akil and Salim Akil, who serve as executive producers alongside Berlanti and Sarah Schecter. The pilot will, of course, focus on Jefferson Pierce, aka Black Lightning. According to Deadline, the show will follow a version of Pierce who has long since retired but finds himself fighting the good fight once again as a result of events involving his son and daughter. Though Pierce’s comic book counterpart also has two children, that version has two daughters, Anissa and Jennifer Pierce. As they have been involved with the Outsiders and the Justice Society, respectively, this suggests that Pierce’s children in the series may ultimately come to follow his heroic example.
There is no word yet on whether or not ‘Black Lightning’ will fit into the so-called “Arrowverse”, which currently includes ‘Arrow’, ‘The Flash’, ‘Supergirl’, and ‘Legends of Tomorrow’, but given Berlanti’s involvement it will not be surprising if the show turns out to have at least a tangential connection to that larger universe. If nothing else, it may connect in the same way ‘Supergirl’ does, with a setting on a parallel Earth.
Making his first appearance in 1977, Black Lightning was DC’s first headlining African American superhero (that is to say, the first to have his own series). The character was co-created by writer Tony Isabella and artist Trevor Von Eeden. Interestingly, prior to his work with Black Lightning, Isabella had also written for Marvel’s first headlining African American superhero: Luke Cage.
Stay tuned to ScienceFiction.com for more news on the ‘Black Lightening’ pilot as it becomes available!
