We’ve known for a while that the NBC drama Heroes is being rebooted as a 13-episode continuation series. NBC has been dropping tidbits of information about the new version of the series, called Heroes Reborn, for quite some time, but today the show finally got a little more traction, signing on former Chuck star Zachary Levi to headline the upcoming drama.
Heroes has been off the air since 2010, and when it returns there should be some common threads to the original show, but Heroes Reborn will obviously not be exactly the same show set five years later. Levi’s casting certainly highlights this, as the actor was on Chuck for a good chunk of the time when Heroes had its initial run and did not star in the original series. So far, NBC is keeping mum about the role Levi will be playing, but TV Line is reporting the role will be a “key” one.
Zachary Levi isn’t the first person to be cast in Heroes Reborn. Over the summer, we learned that Jack Coleman had signed on as the first—and first returning—member of the cast. Coleman is set to reprise his gig as Noah Bennett, a horn-rimmed glasses wearing dude who happened to be the father of Claire (Hayden Panettiere) during the series. You would think with his inclusion that Claire might also be a part of Heroes Reborn, but since Panettiere recently had a baby and is also starring in ABC’s Nashville, I have no idea if that will work out. In fact, other big actors from the original series, including Zachary Quinto, are in pretty high demand at this point, and if the writers were hoping that more former characters might pop up in Heroes Reborn, scheduling could be part of the reason the series has taken a while to get off the ground.
In fact, we first got a glimpse of Heroes Reborn way back in February of last year, when NBC released a teaser trailer for the new 13-episode series during the Winter Olympics.
While it has been nearly a year since we first began hearing about the new Heroes-oriented show, it looks like things are finally off the ground. Along with the Zachary Levi casting, the show plans to get other major castings underway over the next couple of weeks. We’ll keep you posted as NBC announces who else will be joining the series over the next few weeks. Hopefully, we’ll be seeing Heroes Reborn on the schedule sooner rather than later.
