HBO Comedy About Superhero Movie-Making Confirms Cast

Superhero comics have dominated our popular culture for the better part of the past century, as well as the various movies, television shows, video games, and radio plays that are inspired by them. A new potential HBO series, The Franchise, is set to poke fun at the circumstances of the superhero boom — and it has officially found its ensemble cast. On Friday, HBO announced the cast of the pilot episode, which will be the first episode of U.S. television directed by Sam Mendes.

Billy Magnussen (Game Night, Made for Love), Jessica Hynes (Spaced), Darren Goldstein (Ozark), Lolly Adefope (Shrill) and Isaac Powell (American Horror Story) will star in the series. Daniel Brühl (The Falcon and the Winter Soldier) and Richard E. Grant (Loki) will have recurring roles should The Franchise go to series.

What is The Franchise about?

The Franchise follows a hopeful crew trapped inside the dysfunctional, nonsensical, joyous hellscape of franchise superhero movie-making. If and when they finally make the day, the question they must face — is this Hollywood’s new dawn or cinema’s last stand? Is this a dream factory or a chemical plant?

Mendes originated the idea for the show and will direct and executive produce. Jon Brown, who has a recurring partnership with HBO through Veep and Avenue 5, wrote the pilot and will serve as showrunner and executive produce. Executive producers on the series will also include Veep creator Armando Iannucci; Neal Street’s Pippa Harris, Nicolas Brown and Julie Pastor; and Keith Akushie, Marina Hyde and Jim Kleverweis.

What are Warner Bros. Discovery’s plans for DC?

The idea of The Franchise being in the works for HBO is particularly interesting, as its parent company, Warner Bros. Discovery, is currently working on a ten-year plan for the DC Universe franchise, with James Gunn and Peter Safran at the helm as co-CEOs.

“Our ambition is to bring Warners back and to produce great high quality films, and as we look at the opportunities that we have broadly, DC is one of the top of the list for us,” Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav explained earlier this year. “You look at Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman, Aquaman — these are brands that are known everywhere in the world. The ability to drive those all over the world with great story is a big opportunity for us. We have done a reset. We’ve restructured the business. We’re going to focus. There will be a team with a 10-year plan focusing just on DC. It’s very similar to the structure that Alan Horn and and Bob Iger put together, very effectively, with Kevin Feige at Disney. We think that we could build a long-term much stronger, sustainable growth business out of DC. And as part of that, we’re going to focus on quality. We’re not going to release any film before it’s ready. We’re not going to release a film to make quarter. The focus is going to be — how do we make each of these films, in general, as good as possible? DC is something that we think we could make better, and we’re focused on it now. We have some great DC films coming up — Black Adam, Shazam!, and The Flash. We’re working on all of those. we’re very excited about them.”

What do you think of the cast for The Franchise? Share your thoughts with us in the comments below!