Jeph Loeb to Exit Marvel Television

Jeph Loeb is out at Marvel Television, just a week after it was announced Kevin Feige has been appointed Chief Creative Officer of Marvel. The news comes after reports surfaced suggesting Feige will now have creative control of nearly the entire Marvel catalog of offerings — meaning he’s now directly responsible for the creative output for both the television and comics arms for the House of Ideas. That’s all in addition to his role as president of Marvel Studios.

A new report from The Hollywood Reporter indicates that Loeb has been planning his exit since before Feige took over, and that it will likely be made official by Thanksgiving.

This ends Loeb’s nine-year run at the studio he helped to create. Nearly a decade later, over thirty seasons of television were created under the producer’s tutelage, including seven seasons of Agents of SHIELD and an interconnected universe of characters on Netflix featuring the likes of Daredevil, Iron Fist, Jessica Jones, and Luke Cage.

Though Loeb ended up providing fans with countless hours of content, his run as the head of Marvel Television was nothing short of tumultuous. Throughout his time at the outfit, Loeb was underneath Ike Perlmutter, the notoriously stingy chairman of Marvel Entertainment. While Feige managed to get out from under Perlmutter’s control — a move that ended up giving the mega-producer virtually unlimited creative opportunities — Loeb was stuck under Ike’s reportedly small budgets for the better part of a decade.

As the nature with television, Loeb’s reign on Marvel Television also saw its fair share of announced projects never to come to fruition. The studio ended up filming pilots for both Marvel’s Most Wanted and Marvel’s New Warriors, neither of which were picked up by any networks. Then, there were the countless trade reports of Marvel TV wanting to do one show after another with ABC or another network and finally, the eventual cancellation of Hulu’s Ghost Rider — one of the final nails in the coffin for the studio.

It’s unclear what the future means for shows currently in production. As of now, only Hulu’s Helstrom remains in active production.

Runaways is due out December 13th while Helstrom and Agents of SHIELD are set for release next year.

Are you surprised to see Loeb receive the boot? What’s been your favorite show under the Marvel Television umbrella? Share your thoughts in the comments below or by tweeting me at @AdamBarnhardt to chat all things Marvel!