It’s Rumor Time: Marvel might be working on a New Warriors show starring Squirrel Girl

TV Line is reporting that Marvel and ABC Studios have started work on The New Warriors, a half-hour superhero comedy series that they’re reportedly shopping around to cable and streaming networks. The most notable thing about the project, though, is the rumor that the show would prominently feature a character who’s not technically a member of the titular group: Doreen Green, a.k.a. Squirrel Girl.

If that name sounds familiar, you’re probably either a Marvel fan—where the light-hearted, villain-trouncing SG has had a renaissance of late, thanks to loving treatments from creators like Ryan North and Erica Henderson—or a follower of Anna Kendrick. Kendrick kicked off some Marvel buzz of her own earlier this year, when she put forth the idea that she’d probably be a pretty good Squirrel Girl, even though nobody at the time was talking about making a project starring the character. (Also, she thought Doreen was half-squirrel, which canonically isn’t the case.) A few weeks later, Stranger Things fan favorite Shannon Purser made a similar bid for the non-existent part, although she’s since signed on for a different comic-book story in The CW’s Riverdale.

The fact that there’s been a lot of Squirrel Girl talk lately, without any word from Marvel that it was pursuing a project based around the character, makes us a little skeptical that this New Warriors thing is entirely legit. (That’s why this article takes place in Rumor Time, and not the far less common Certainty Hour.) Still, it’s not like Marvel’s opposed to teen-oriented superhero fare—it recently announced a series based on Runaways for Hulu—and it’s not like Squirrel Girl’s joyful attitude and cartoonish antics wouldn’t make for a ton of fun on TV, even if we can’t see a big-name movie star like Kendrick stepping down to the small screen to take up the part she more-or-less willed into being for herself.