The CW CEO Mark Pedowitz commented after it was announced that the network had not ordered Powerpuff, the dark adult reboot of the classic Cartoon Network series The Powerpuff Girls. While The CW passed, Powerpuff is being retooled and will be “repiloted,” so there is still a chance that a version will be picked up in the future.
According to Pedowitz (via the Hollywood Reporter):
“The reason we do pilots is, sometimes things miss. We believe in the cast and in [writers Diablo Cody and Heather Regnier] and [executive producer Greg Berlanti] and studio Warner Bros. In this case, the pilot didn’t work. Because we see enough elements in there, we wanted to give it another shot. It may have felt a little too campy and not rooted in reality. You learn things when you test things out. We felt, ‘Let’s take a step back and go back to the drawing board.’ This is a powerful property, it engaged a lot of interest, and we want to get it right.”
Fans of the original were already dreading this Riverdale-style reboot, so for many, it was a relief when Powerpuff was not picked up. Now that the script has leaked perhaps those fans had a reason to be upset and should be extra glad that this didn’t get made.
The leaked script appears to be legit, as Warner Brothers keeps getting it yanked down from social media for copyright infringement.
Here are some non-copywritten highlights from the Powerpuff script:
In this version, Joseph “Mojo” Mondel, was Drake Utonium’s human lab assistant and helped him create the PPGs. In fact, “Mojo” was the actual inventor of Chemical X. But after the PPGs are created, Drake (played by Donald Faison) hogs all the glory and money for himself. This explains why “Mojo” vows to destroy the PPGs later.
There is a scene at the beginning of the girls as children saving Townsville, which may have actually been fun. (If they’re going to make a live-action series, why not make one actually for kids with child actors but with enough in-jokes and references for adults who grew up with the property?) A mystery is set up in that no one can explain why the city is in constant peril and in need of the PPGs on an almost daily basis.
The Powerpuff Girls cartoon actually exists in-universe but Buttercup accuses it of “whitewashing” them.
The story then jumps to Blossom (Chloe Bennet), Bubbles (Dove Cameron), and Buttercup (Yana Perrault) as teens who drink and party. Buttercup is a lesbian who cheats on her girlfriend with multiple other young ladies. (She is shown to be promiscuous throughout the whole show.) The girls have grown to resent their father Drake, who is kind of a scumbag, having made a fortune off of their fame and likenesses and basking in their glory.
One night after getting drunk, the girls are forced to save Townsville in the middle of the night and they KILL Mojo Jojo! At this point, Townsville bans them from using their powers, which is fine as they have grown to resent the fact that they have spent their entire childhood fighting crime.
Before this, Buttercup protests against having to wear the same style dress the girls have been wearing to fight crime in since they were kids. She states “I’m not wearing that dress anymore. It’s compulsory heterosexuality.” (Because it’s The CW.) Drake refuses to allow them to change because of all the licensing he has created in the old style. (Obviously, the writer of this scene knows nothing about licensing, as the more outfits, the more different toys can be made!)
The show then cuts to the girls as adults. They have gone their separate ways, with Blossom going to an Ivy League college and settling down with a loving boyfriend. Even though she is super smart, she struggles with anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder from her childhood.
Bubbles went to Hollywood to become famous and she wound up as a typical troubled teen star with a failed reality TV series. She has been in and out of rehab and was engaged to Butch of the Rowdyruff Boys. (Now see… that’s the kind of reference I can get behind.) It appears the engagement ended when she sold the ring to buy drugs.
Buttercup acts as a firefighter and she and Bubbles have actually remained in contact.
It appears that after they were banned, the threats against Townville mysteriously disappeared.
The girls must reunite and return to Townsville on their 25th birthday to collect their inheritance. (It’s called that, but I’m not sure if that’s right, as no one dies. They’re just collecting the money generated from when they were kids.) At any rate, it turns out there is no money as Drake blew it and he begs the girls to stay and reunite so he can continue to exploit them. He says he feels that evil is returning.
Mojo Mondel’s son, Joseph “Jojo” Mondel (Nicholas Podany) is now the mayor. He resents Drake for stealing all the glory and money from creating the PPGs from his father, whom, you may recall was KILLED by them! But politically, he isn’t doing well and it looks as though he will lose the next election, so he hatches an evil scheme to stage an attack on the city, have the PPGs save the day, and endorse him.
In order to do this, he creates tiny mind control devices called “Wooly Bears” but the devices don’t affect the PPG, they affect Drake and everyone else in Townsville. Of course, the PPGs manage to free everyone by the end. The town embraces them once more and now that it appears that the city really is in danger, the PPGs must stick around. (Well, of course! Otherwise, there would be no series.)
There is a scene in which Jojo vows to find another way to win the election and “take out” the PPGs. It is also revealed that Mojo is still alive and his brain has been implanted in a monkey’s body.
It is also revealed that Drake has been back in the lab working on new, secret experiments. (The implication is that he is the one who has been behind all the threats to Townsville from the very beginning, creating monsters and villains so that the PPGs have something to fight and making them famous in the process.)
And that’s about it. There is more CW-style cringy dialogue. At one point Buttercup threatens to leak Blossom’s nudes. Bubbles’ lines are peppered with references to social media. Words like “triggered” and “woke” are used.
So yeah, Riverdale was a big hit, but not everything needs a dark reboot.
