Cress Williams Lands The Lead In CW’s ‘Black Lightning’
It looks like someone in the Berlantiverse is a really big Prison Break fan! After casting Wentworth Miller and Dominic Purcell as Captain Cold and Heat Wave, they’re now adding another Prison Break alumni in the form of Cress Williams, who will take the lead in their upcoming Black Lightning pilot.
Williams played the role of Company assassin Wyatt Matthewson during season 4 of the jailbreak drama, but has been a regular face on tv screens, appearing in Code Black, Hart of Dixie, Friday Night Lights, Grey’s Anatomy, ER, and Veronica Mars over the years.
Black Lightning tells the story of Jefferson Pierce (Williams), a retired superhero who is forced to squeeze back into the spandex, when his daughter and a star student get caught up with a local gang. He is an olympic level athlete & skilled martial artist, who can also generate and manipulate electricity. The comic book was developed by Tony Isabella with Trevor Von Eeden in 1977, and was one of DC’s first major African-American superheroes, and has been a regular part of the Justice League.
What makes this an interesting change from the other CW series, is the fact it’s not the usual (as Cat Grant put it) “attractive yet non-threatening racially diverse cast of a CW show.” At 46yrs old, the lead character is substantially older than the other heroes he’ll be joining at CW, and someone who has ‘been there, done that’ with the whole heroing business already. It’s adds a new dimension to their current line up of Supergirl, Flash, Arrow and Legends Of Tomorrow.
Currently still only a pilot, it remains to be seen if Black Lightning will be picked up to a full series, but we’ll let you know when we hear more.
