In May, we learned that ABC had declined to move forward with
AKA Jessica Jones. A show that was based on Brian Michael Bendis' extraordinary
Alias comic. It was being adapted by
Twilight and
Birds Of Prey screenwriter, Melissa Rosenberg, who described her series as, "It's dark material. It's not
'Captain America.’ I mean, it is some pretty gritty, adult-themed stuff. So we'll have to see how that fits [on network television]. She's a former superhero with post-traumatic stress disorder trying to make it as a detective in New York. But she keeps on getting pulled back in, because she has some minor superpowers. She's got like B-level superpowers – she's so awesome! But she keeps on getting pulled back in, so she's straddling the two worlds.”
Collider's Christina Radish recently asked Melissa Rosenberg about the show while she was doing press for her latest film,
The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 2.
Did you originally sign on with ABC to do AKA Jessica Jones?
ROSENBERG: Yeah, I did the Jessica Jones pilot, but they didn’t pick it up to pilot. The studio still owns it, and I think we’re going to go shop it around to some other outlets to see. So, that’s on hold. But, they just came back to me the next season and said, “Well, we have this Dutch series.” Red Widow is based on a Dutch series, called Penoza. I watched the series and went, “This is not a network show. You can’t do this on network.” But, Paul Lee was like, “No, I want to do it on the network.” And I thought, “Okay, but are we going to be dialing back the edge and the violence?,” but no, we’re really not. Aside from swearing and maybe too much blood, and a little writhing and sex scenes, the storytelling has been incredibly edgy. So, we’ll see if the audience jumps on board.