Before She-Hulk: Attorney At Law, Jessica Gao pitched a Grosse Pointe Blank-inspired Black Widow series
Black Widow would have looked very different if it was up to the Emmy-winning Rick And Morty writer
Showbiz tends to involve a lot of rejection before landing a win, and She-Hulk: Attorney At Law’s head writer Jessica Gao certainly knows it after well over a decade working in TV. In a new interview with The Hollywood Reporter, the Emmy-winning Rick And Morty alum opens up about her long road to joining the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
“When Marvel comes knocking, you have to drop everything and then devote weeks of your life convincing them to give you a job,” Gao tells THR. “[She-Hulk] was actually my fourth time pitching at Marvel. I’d been trying to get in the door for years, and so by the time She-Hulk rolled around, I’d already been armed with three Marvel rejections. So I just figured, ‘What’s a fourth one? I’ve got the armor. I don’t care anymore. I’ve got nothing to live for except for this project.’ So the show that I pitched to them that day is basically the show that we made. I mean, there’s little details here and there that got dropped along the way, but at its core, it’s the same show.”
The Silicon Valley and Robot Chicken vet doesn’t share what all of her previous ideas were, but one of them was a take on Black Widow inspired by the John Cusack-starring hitman comedy Grosse Pointe Blank. Eric Pearson, Jac Schaeffer, and Ned Benson ended up getting the gig instead, and Natasha Romanoff’s long-delayed 2021 solo feature was a blend of classic spy fare and family drama. Now, Gao’s vision has finally found its place at Marvel Studios.
She-Hulk: Attorney At Law marks the MCU’s first full foray into half-hour comedy. The series premiered earlier this month on Disney+ and follows the literal trials of Jennifer Walters, a lawyer who becomes the titular hero after accidentally absorbing her cousin Bruce Banner’s gamma-irradiated blood.