Despite being ridiculed when it was initially announced, and then putting out a dismally received pilot for consideration, The CW’s live-action series based on the Powerpuff Girls cartoon is still actively being developed for the network. While The CW is best known for its Arrowverse shows and other teen dramas such as Riverdale, executive producer Greg Berlanti, who has been behind many of these projects and more for the last decade, seems to have come up against a formidable foe in trying to get the Powerpuff Girls off the ground. With that said, the latest reports have suggested that the show is not dead in the water yet.
In 2020, the show entitled Powerpuff was first revealed to be in production, with a pilot being written by Heather Regnier and Diablo Cody and starring Chloe Bennet, Dove Cameron and Yanna Perrault as the titular Powerpuff Girls Blossom, Bubbles and Buttercup, respectively. However, despite the pilot being recorded and put up for consideration, The CW declined the show and when script extracts were leaked online, it became clear that there were a lot of issues around the tone of the show. At that point, it seemed that the project was destined to slip into obscurity and never be mentioned again.
Now in TVLine’s Inside Line, a question was asked about whether Powerpuff was now officially dead, and the answer given was quite surprising. TVLine confirmed:
"I am assured that The CW’s live-action adaptation of the Powerpuff Girls, after coming in last spring “too campy” (and which definitely no longer costars Chloe Bennet), is still in some stage of redevelopment."
Powerpuff Will Make a Lot of Changes From the Original Pilot
In August of last year, it was announced that Chloe Bennet would not be continuing as part of the reworking of the project due to “scheduling conflicts,” and the series was instantly without one of its lead actresses. There has been no word since on who will be playing Blossom in Bennet’s place, but it is probably going to turn out to be the slightest change made to the project following the scathing take-down of the original pilot’s campiness and unfunny sexual-innuendo scenes.
When The CW turned down Powerpuff the first time, it was said that the story was being completely re-developed to make the whole project more serious in tone. Even if the new script manages to do enough to make the show a viable prospect, recent events around The CW’s future could well end up making it all irrelevant. Since the merger of Warner Bros. and Discovery, there have been a lot of changes made behind the scenes and that is something that will continue for several months to come. Additionally, since the beginning of the year, there have been discussions about WarnerMedia and Paramount wanting to sell The CW, which would once again alter the future of the network and any projects that may possibly be in contention to be given a series order. Whether we find out more about any of this next week when The CW Upfronts take place is unknown, but there is certainly a lot to be discussed.