Destin Daniel Cretton to produce Marvel's Wonder Man series for Disney Plus
The Shang-Chi And The Legend Of The Ten Rings director returns to the Marvel Cinematic Universe
Following the news last year that Destin Daniel Cretton would be making a Marvel series for Disney+, Variety has reported that the show will be about Wonder Man. Given the Shang-Chi And The Legend Of The Ten Rings director’s involvement, many fans had assumed that the story would be a spin-off about the master of kung fu’s sister Xialing, played by Meng’er Zhang.
The character of Wonder Man, also known as Simon Williams, dates back to 1964. In his comics origins, he gains superhuman strength and durability after being experimented on by Baron Zemo and is an antagonist to the Avengers before eventually joining them.
Zemo is portrayed by Daniel Brühl in the Marvel Cinematic Universe and was introduced in 2016's Captain America: Civil War. When he was last seen in The Falcon And The Winter Soldier, he was trying to eradicate the supersoldier serum, so it seems pretty unlikely that the source of Wonder Man’s powers will stay the same.
Wonder Man’s brain patterns were originally used to program Vision, who in live action was created by Tony Stark, Bruce Banner, and Ultron. A rebooted version of the android was introduced at the end of WandaVision, so it’s possible that the characters could end up connected down the line.
As Simon Williams, Wonder Man is also an actor and was at one point meant to make a cameo in Guardians Of The Galaxy Vol. 2, played by Nathan Fillion. The Firefly actor went on to voice the character in Hulu’s M.O.D.O.K., though the stop motion animated series was not connected to the MCU.
Andrew Guest will be the head writer on the Wonder Man series, along with executing producing. He’s a veteran of shows including Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Community, and 30 Rock and has already worked with Marvel Studios as a consulting producer on Hawkeye. Cretton will also executive produce, with The Hollywood Reporter writing that he may direct at least one episode.
Cretton is currently filming an adaptation of Gene Luen Yang’s graphic novel American Born Chinese for Disney+, starring Everything Everywhere All At Once’s Michelle Yeoh, Ke Huy Quan, and Stephanie Hsu. He has also been tapped to direct and write the sequel to Shang-Chi, though there has been no word as to when that’s expected to happen.