Marvel Announces Zodiac, a Live Action Spy Thriller Series Set for 2028

Marvel Television has announced a new live action series titled Zodiac, a spy thriller set for release in 2028. The news comes at a time when it felt like all Marvel Studios was doing was canceling its live action shows on Disney Plus. Apparently, that's not the case.

We had already heard that Zodiac might be a code name for the show. As it turns out, it's the actual title. Below, I'll go through what the report says, what we already know about the upcoming phase, and why the spy thriller label gives me pause.

Deadline reports Marvel's Zodiac is a spy thriller coming in 2028

This broke within about the last 15 minutes. Deadline ran it under the headline "Marvel sets new live action spy thriller series Zodiac for 2028," reporting that "Marvel television announced a new liveaction television series titled Zodiac. The series revealed at New York Comic-Con on Thursday is a spy thriller and is set for a release in 2028 per the studio."

The report also covers things we already know, like VisionQuest coming up. It points out that this is coming at a really weird time for Marvel, since reports last month said live action television could be coming to an end completely.

Scoopers called the Zodiac series early, with True Detective and X-Files comparisons

Credit where credit's due: the scoopers definitely nailed this one. They talked about a Zodiac series right around the time Lanterns was starting on HBO. I know I don't usually cover DC content, but if you want my opinion on Lanterns in one word, it was amazing, and I definitely can't wait for more. I know some diehards and purists said it really messed with the lore. I didn't care about that. I thought the show overall was an awesome addition to the DCU.

The scoopers described this spy thriller in two ways. One industry insider said it might be something along the lines of a True Detective show, which was crazy because it came out right as Lanterns was hitting HBO, which was sort of rumored to be in the style of True Detective. By the end of Lanterns, I didn't take it that way at all, and I had completely forgotten about that comparison.

The more recent update was that Zodiac might be something more like an X-Files show set in the MCU. Quite honestly, either premise is super interesting. We just have no idea what team, organization or heroes the show is built around, what the plot is, who the villain is, or who the protagonist might be.

Zodiac likely fits a 2028 phase built on new characters

What we do know about the upcoming phase in 2028 is that we'll be getting lots of introductions to the MCU. There's an X-Men reboot with an all new cast. We may have been introduced to Jean Grey and one or two other X-Men in Avengers: Secret Wars, but for the most part they're all new characters. Then there's a Ghost Rider film with a brand new actor and character. And in the third installment of the Black Panther trilogy, we'll be introduced to a new T'Challa, that's if we're not introduced to him during Avengers: Secret Wars.

Knowing the new saga is set to introduce new characters, I would assume that's exactly what this show is doing. It may be one of those shows that leaves us on the edge of our seat guessing, where we don't really find out what's going on until somewhere near the end. This is something I've been asking Marvel for a while: stop holding our hand, do something interesting, do something new. It looks like that's the route they're going.

The spy thriller label brings back memories of Secret Invasion

When they said spy thriller, I'm sure a lot of people, like me, had to pause for a second. That leaves a bad taste for a lot of Marvel fans who were following Disney Plus religiously until Secret Invasion. To me, Secret Invasion is unequivocally and without a doubt the worst thing Marvel Studios has ever done, for Nick Fury's character, for Rhodey's character, and for the title and iconography of Secret Invasion.

I was part of the press junket for Secret Invasion. I interviewed some of the actors and the director, and they spoke of all the inspirations from classic spy espionage thrillers in film and TV. The budget on that show was $250 million. When you compare that to some Hollywood hits that were extremely profitable and made for a fraction of that, Secret Invasion was, in my opinion, the worst thing Marvel Studios has ever done.

Hopefully they learned lessons from that. But calling this a spy thriller, leaving us basically in the dark about what it's about, and naming it Zodiac, which of course invokes a specific imagery in the zeitgeist, all seem like elements of what they tried to do with Secret Invasion. That was a terrible mistake and an absolute flop.

Wonder Man and Daredevil: Born Again cancellations make fans ask how invested to be

It makes me wonder about Marvel's point of view when it greenlights Wonder Man publicly only to cancel it a couple of months later, or announces that Daredevil: Born Again is ending after its third season. It puts the fandom in a place where we have to ask how invested we should be in these shows. If we really like a show, is there any chance of a second season?

Wonder Man was an amazing addition to the MCU and something interesting as a television show. Pretty much the entire consensus, at least among those who watched it, was that we couldn't wait to see Wonder Man again. We wondered if he'd be in Doomsday or Avengers: Secret Wars, only for Marvel to greenlight a second season and then cancel it almost immediately, 60 days later. The reason given was that it was a decision made behind closed doors. One of the top creatives said schedules were cleared and "everything was done" when the contracting was done, and it just didn't go down at the 11th hour.

Marvel's live action shows may now be built to work together

Looking back, I wonder if canceling shows like Wonder Man and Daredevil: Born Again was specifically to make room for starting over, with television shows woven together to work as one singular thing throughout the mutant saga. Wonder Man and Daredevil really didn't have anything to do with each other other than being set in the MCU.

Maybe Marvel Studios wants a different approach to answer the lack of profitability these shows have offered Disney Plus. There may have been a time when the promise of all this Marvel content was driving people to sign up. But people who don't have Disney Plus don't see the shows, and that hurts the ratings numbers. Even when shows were doing well, like Wonder Man, they weren't charting, and people certainly weren't signing up for Disney Plus to see them. Outside of a limited number of licensing options after a show airs, that's the only way Marvel Studios has to make money, so it doesn't justify the budgets.

So maybe now the live action series will all be working toward one specific goal, basically meaning if you saw this one, you have to see the next one. That was missing from these TV shows spread out on their own, and it gives them a reason for existing instead of just greenlighting an IP to see if it makes money. Their model isn't built for turning these projects into cash, and I think that's what's hurt them the most. What's hurt them more is blowing $250 million on "an absolute abomination, no pun intended," like Secret Invasion, where Nick Fury's arc went nowhere and they ruined massive characters like Rhodey.

VisionQuest shows big budgets can still have a purpose

Marvel doesn't have to stop doing big budget productions. If you look at the VisionQuest trailer, it's very clear a lot of money went into it, not just in CGI but the show itself. But a show has to have a purpose for existing. If it isn't monetizing the way they want on Disney Plus, it has to serve a bigger purpose in service of the story, which their TV shows have lacked.

I wonder if VisionQuest will be one they felt they had to finish to close the trilogy, though it certainly doesn't seem like that. The rumors say it leads into Avengers: Secret Wars, and there's a good chance his son Tommy will be full on Speed by the end, another character we'll see as part of the Young Avengers, Champions or Resistance. That gives the show a huge reason for existing beyond closing out the trilogy of WandaVision, Agatha All Along and VisionQuest.

It also brings back Ultron, and I think having Ultron in the MCU going forward, at least as an entity if he survives the show, is a service to the MCU, not a disservice. He's a villain who can always pop in and out, and when played by James Spader, I think he's a better addition than what would otherwise maybe be a dry and flat character.

What do you think Zodiac is, and which character do you think it's following?