The “Ironheart” series at Disney Plus has tapped Chinaka Hodge to serve as head writer, Variety has learned exclusively from sources.
“Ironheart” will star Dominique Thorne as Marvel character Riri Williams, a genius inventor and the creator of the most advanced suit of armor since Iron Man. The show was first announced as being in development during Disney’s investor day presentation in December.
Reps for Hodge and Marvel Studios declined to comment.
Hodge is a screenwriter, poet, playwright, and educator. Her past television writing credits include the Apple reboot of “Amazing Stories,” as well as the TNT series adaptation of “Snowpiercer” starring Daveed Diggs. She has published two books of poetry to date, “For Girls with Hips: Collected Poems and Writings” and “Dated Emcees,” while her plays include “Chasing Mehserle” and “Mirrors in Every Corner.” She is also a founding member of the hip hop collective The Getback along with Diggs and others.
She is repped by WME and Mosaic.
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Williams was first introduced in the Marvel comics in 2016, the creation of writer Brian Michael Bendis and artist Mike Deodato. In the comics, she is a 15-year-old MIT student who reverse engineers Iron Man’s armor in order to create armor of her own. Iron Man, a.k.a. Tony Stark, eventually took notice and gave her his encouragement to pursue the life of a superhero.
“Ironheart” is one of multiple Marvel-Disney Plus shows currently in the works that will focus on women of color. Bisha K. Ali is currently working on the “Ms. Marvel” series at the streamer starring Iman Vellani, while Jessica Gao is leading the “She-Hulk” series starring Tatiana Maslany.
The Marvel shows “WandaVision” and “The Falcon and the Winter Soldier” have already debuted on the streamer, with “Loki” set to bow in June. Others in the pipeline include “Hawkeye,” “Secret Invasion,” “Moon Knight,” and an untitled Wakanda series.
