The Inhumans weren't always destined for television. In fact, Marvel originally had a much bigger plan for this secretive people and their royal family: a feature film. However, between October 2014 and November 2016, Inhumans underwent a seismic shift behind the scenes. The property moved from film to television, which paved the way for the eight-episode premiere season that debuted its first two episodes in IMAX and will hit television this week. So how did we end up here?

In order to answer that, we first need travel back to 1965. The Inhumans made their comic book debut in Fantastic Four #65 as the then-latest collaboration between artist Jack Kirby and writer Stan Lee. The legendary Marvel Comics duo created them as a secret society of humans whose genetics had been altered by the alien race the Kree, which grants them superpowers -- but only when exposed to the Terrigen Mists. Far more advanced than their human counterparts, the Inhumans shut themselves away in their mysterious city Attilan, where they remained undiscovered until a brainwashed Medusa ran afoul of the Fantastic Four. She was subsequently rescued by her sister Crystal and the rest of the Royal Inhumans, but this interaction led to the human discovery of their people and their subsequent involvement in (some) human affairs.

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Though they've been around since the '60s, the Inhumans occupy a rather niche corner of the Marvel Universe, at least in the comics. Until recently, they simply popped up in other comics or in their own limited series, like Paul Jenkins and Jae Lee's 12-issue Inhumans and the War of Kings event by Dan Abnett, Andy Lanning and Paul Pelletier. That is, until Infinity happened.

Infinity -- a six-issue event series by Jonathan Hickman, Jim Cheung, Jerome Opeña and Dustin Weaver that ran from late 2013 to mid-2014 -- thrust the Inhumans to the forefront of the Marvel Universe when Black Bolt, the Inhuman king, released Terrigen into the Earth's atmosphere. Black Bolt released the Terrigen in a last ditch effort to save his people, even the wake of Attilan's destruction. Subsequently, the Terrigen triggered Terrigenesis in dormant Inhumans around the globe, sparking a wave of "NuHumans" and an Inhuman population boom. Thus, the Inhumans suddenly had a large presence in the Marvel Universe -- and they got multiple titles to match.

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Five months later in October 2014, Marvel Studios announced a slate of films that extended into May 2019, including an Inhumans movie. With a release date of November 2, 2018, Inhumans joined the ranks of Black PantherCaptain Marvel and Avengers: Infinity War. The Inhumans movie was later pushed back to July 12, 2019 to accommodate for Spider-Man: Homecoming after Marvel Studios and Sony struck a deal to share the rights to Spider-Man. After rumors that Inhumans would be delayed, it was removed from Marvel Studios' calendar altogether in April 2016. All the while, Guardians of the Galaxy star Vin Diesel "voiced" his support for the film by repeatedly discussing his desire to play Black Bolt.

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Meanwhile, the Inhumans made their first jump from comics to TV. Though the Royal Family wasn't involved, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. debuted the Inhumans as a race in December 2014, just two months after the original announcement of the Inhumans film. In the Season 2 episode "What They Become," Daisy Johnson -- then known as Skye -- underwent Terrigenesis to become the Inhuman known as Quake, confirming what many fans believed.

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The Inhumans went on to become a centerpiece of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Season 2, where Daisy discovered a secret society of Inhumans who had been thriving on Earth for centuries. In the season finale, her Inhuman mother Jiaying's failed plan for conquest resulted in a worldwide Terrigen contamination when several crystals tumbled into the ocean. Echoing Black Bolt's Terrigen bomb from Infinity, this set the stage for Season 3, where Daisy and her fellow S.H.I.E.L.D. agents dealt with new Inhumans emerging all over the world, all while global governments struggled to keep up. Season 3 marked the formation of the Secret Warriors, a team of Inhumans led by Daisy who ran missions for S.H.I.E.L.D., and the emergence of Hive, an ancient Inhuman villain with some valuable insight on the race's history. Season 4 also featured Inhuman characters, though their Inhumanity was not the focal point of the story arc. To date, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. has never made a direct reference to or discovered the Inhuman royal family.

Then, in November 2016, Marvel made a shocking announcementInhumans -- which would focus on the Inhuman royal family -- would be adapted as a television show, not a movie. Roughly six months after the property was removed from the film schedule, it found new life as an eight-episode series that debuted its first two episodes on IMAX screens for a two-week window — the first-time a live-action TV series has done so. Starting this Friday, the series will air on ABC with “additional exclusive content that can only be seen on the network.”

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At the red carpet premiere for Inhumans earlier this month, Head of Marvel Television Jeph Loeb revealed how this major transition came to be. “Well, as you know Marvel is one big giant company, and this was a property that was in movie division, and when they looked at their schedule and realized what they wanted to be doing, [Inhumans] was something that was gonna push very far out,” he explained. “So we started having a conversation with them about, ‘well, maybe this is something that would work as a television series,’ and that worked out really well.”

Between February 21st and March 3rd, Marvel began revealing the core cast one-by-one, culminating in a full-cast announce. Production in Hawaii took off quickly from there, with set photos of pre-CGI Lockjaw, Black Bolt, Medusa and more surfacing online. As the series rapidly developed, more about the show' direction came out and word went out that Inhumans would not yet be directly connected to Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., despite the latter series' deep ties to Inhuman continuity; eventually, the two series would come to be "linked." This past May, Marvel released the first photo of the Inhuman royal family and dropped the series' first trailer.

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As Inhumans' IMAX debut loomed, the show drew "mixed reactions" and early word on the project predicted it would "disappoint" at the box office. Inhumans went on to pull in an underwhelming $2.6 million box office and negative reviews over its opening weekend. This double whammy -- and the release of a new poster that calls Inhumans “the complete series” -- have led some to speculate that the show has already been cancelled, even prior to its network premiere.

Much like its comic book counterpart, Inhumans has traveled a long, winding road to the spotlight. After the film's surprise announcement, Inhumans bounced along Marvel Studios' schedule, until it finally landed on television -- and in IMAX -- as an eight-episode series. After a series of bad reviews and a poor opening box office, Inhumans still has a long way to go, but the show will attempt to kick off its bold new adventure this Friday when the show makes its long-awaited debut on ABC.


The first two episodes of Marvel’s Inhumans debuted in IMAX theaters on September 1, kicking off a two-week run. On September 29, the show will make its broadcast debut on ABC. The network will show the eight-episode first season of Inhumans in its entirety, including content from the first two episodes not seen in the IMAX run. The drama stars Anson Mount as Black Bolt, Iwan Rheon as Maximus the Mad, Serinda Swan as Queen Medusa, Ken Leung as Karnak, Isabelle Cornish as Crystal, Eme Ikwuakor as Gorgon, Mike Moh as Triton and Sonya Balmores as Auran.