In just a matter of days, Stargirl is going to officially make its debut, bringing the latest live-action DC Comics adaptation into the mainstream. The series, which will debut both on the DC Universe streaming service and The CW, will follow the adventures of Courtney Whitmore/Stargirl (Brec Bassinger), Pat Dugan/STRIPE (Luke Wilson), and a new generation of the Justice Society of America, as they attempt to fight the Injustice Society. As the series’ trailers have already shown, there are quite a lot of fantastical superpowers and elements being brought into the series — and it sounds like that required some impressive work. In a recent interview with Entertainment Weekly, Stargirl co-creator Geoff Johns spoke about how the series “required doing things differently than other shows,” which also required the use of previsualization techniques.
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“We were the first show with Warner Bros. to use pre-viz,” Johns explained, going on to add that they wanted Courtney’s Stargirl staff to “have a personality and be alive when she fights with it.” This led to them working with Captain Marvel‘s Walter Garcia, who served as stunt coordinator and second-unit director on the series.
“Utilizing all these tools that we used on Wonder Woman, Aquaman, Shazam [allowed us to] not only have these great emotional, heartwarming, fun stories, but also these visuals that you haven’t seen in superhero shows before,” Johns added. “I can’t wait for people to see the opening scene. I don’t think people really expect Stargirl to be visually as big as it is.”
The series stars Brec Bassinger as Courtney Whitmore/Stargirl, Amy Smart as Barbara Whitmore, Luke Wilson as Pat Dugan/STRIPE, Joel McHale as Sylvester Pemberton/Starman, Lou Ferrigno Jr. as Rex Tyler/Hourman, Brian Stapf as Ted Grant/Wildcat, Henry Thomas as Charles McNider/Doctor Midnight, Joy Osmanski as Paula Brooks/Tigress, Neil Hopkins as Lawrence “Crusher” Crock/Sportsmaster, and Nelson Lee as Dragon King.
The series joins both DC Universe’s eclectic array of original programming, including Titans, Young Justice: Outsiders, Doom Patrol, and Harley Quinn, as well as The CW’s roster of The Flash, Supergirl, Legends of Tomorrow, Batwoman, and Black Lightning.
“It’s cool; it’s going to take the Stars and STRIPE comic, the Justice Society comic, and merge it into one thing,” Johns revealed in an interview last year. “And tonally, it’s Spider-Man: Homecoming and Buffy the Vampire Slayer along with the [comic] books. We’re bringing a lot of the legacy stuff into it, a lot of the stuff James Robinson did with the Justice Society. I love all of that, his JSA: The Golden Age series, launching the [1999 series] JSA… I’ve always wanted to do a series based on Stars and STRIPE, so it’s really exciting.”
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Stargirl will premiere on May 18th on DC Universe, and May 19th at 8/7c on The CW.
