SPOILER WARNING: This article contains minor spoilers for the first four episodes of Marvel's Runaways, debuting Nov. 21 on Hulu.


Based on the marketing, it might be easy to dismiss Marvel's Runaways as little more than a CW-style teen drama, albeit one with a dinosaur. And, yes, the new Hulu series is chock-full of adolescent angst and rebellion, but also sinister conspiracies, murder, magic and aliens. In short, it very well may be the most faithful television adaptations of a comic book yet -- in spirit, in any case.

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Based on the beloved 2003 Marvel Comics series created by Brian K. Vaughan and Adrian Alphona, the genius of Runaways is in its relatively simple, and undeniably relatable, premise: Six kids discover that their parents are secretly members of a villainous cabal known as the Pride, and unite to stop them. (What grounded teen hasn't suspected their parents might actually be evil?)

The Hulu drama, developed by Josh Schwartz and Stephanie Savage (The O.C.), imbues that setup with emotional layers the source material (as good as it is) didn't have. Exploiting the serial format of the medium, the series develops the shared backstory of titular teens, turning them into close-knit friends driven apart by tragedy, and transforming their parents from mustache-twirling supervillains into complex characters with distinct motivations, problems and flaws. Some of them are -- dare we say it? -- almost likable.

Although Runaways ditches the notion of "supervillains," it keeps intact the Pride as a secret society united by intertwining business interests (property development, pharmaceutical research, etc.) and far more sinister pursuits, somehow tied to the Church of Gibborim, a Scientology-like New Age group headed by Leslie Dean (Annie Wersching), mother of Karolina (Virginia Gardner). Wealthy pillars of their communities, they meet once a year at the home of Geoffrey Wilder and Catherine Wilder (Ryan Sands and Angel Parker), purportedly to plan their philanthropic activities. The truth is, of course, much darker, to say nothing of weirder.

Once inseparable but now estranged following the apparent suicide of Amy Minoru, the older sister of isolated goth Nico (Lyrica Okano), the children reunite at the Wilder house that same evening, in part through the efforts of nerdy Alex Wilder (Rhenzy Feliz), but also through a series of unfortunate coincidences: Lacrosse player Chase Stein (Gregg Sulkin) stands up Gert Yorkes (Ariela Barer), who had offered to tutor him in Spanish, to instead go to a party. There, good-girl Karolina passes out after removing her Church of Gibborim bracelet for the first time in her life, revealing her iridescent true form, and is nearly sexually assaulted by Chase's jock friends. Left home alone, where there's something lurking behind a door in the basement, young Molly Hernandez (not Hayes, played by Allegra Acosta) calls her adoptive sister Gert -- a significant departure from the source material -- and pleads to be taken anywhere but there.

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Their separate paths ultimately lead to Alex's house, where they take the first fumbling steps toward reconciling their differences, and coming to terms with Amy's death, before making the decision that will dramatically change their lives: to explore a hidden passage in the study of Alex's father that leads to a subterranean chamber, where their parents conduct a solemn ritual that involves the sacrifice of a teenage runaway "rescued" by the Church of Gibborim. It's that discovery, and a suspicion by the parents that the children might have spied on them, that sets into motion the plot of Runaways.

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However, the series is in no rush to follow the title characters as they flee the crypt, and instead with the second episode rewinds the events of the day to offer the parents' perspectives -- and the story is all the stronger for it. We see these adults for who, and what, they are, rather than how their children view them.

Chase's father Victor (James Marsters) is a brilliant but emotionally and physically abusive inventor whose wife Janet (Ever Carradine) nevertheless covers for his most recent failure, complicating the Pride's plans and risking public exposure. Gert's parents Dale and Stacey Yorkes (Kevin Weisman and Brigid Brannagh) are quirky, Phish-loving bioengineers who are looked down upon by the other members, even as they secretly plot to escape the group's grasp by uprooting their family, and their dinosaur, to Central America. Karolina's mother Leslie Dean is the ambitious, secretive cult leader whose primary focus is to restore the mysterious husk of a man kept on life support in her private meditation room, even at the expense of her husband Frank (Kip Pardue), a former teen star who finds both his career and his marriage stalled. Geoffrey Wilder is a land developer who can't escape his criminal past, and Catherine Wilder a successful lawyer determined to preserve what's hers, at any cost. Nico's mother Tina Minoru (Brittany Ishibashi) is a brilliant innovator who froze out her daughter and husband Robert (James Yaegashi) following Amy's apparent suicide, and is suspected by other members of the Pride in the deaths of Molly's parents.

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These are nuanced characters, every bit as interesting as the Runaways themselves, and their scenes are integral to understanding both the events of the series and the actions of their children. Chase is a jock, but not of the stereotypical dumb variety, whose flashes of technological brilliance are hobbled by his father's high expectations, not to mention his abuse. The youthful face of the Church of Gibborim, Karolina yearns to break free of her pristine image and lead the life of a "normal" teen. Nico is alone and powerless within her own home, which her mother controls using an artificial intelligence system, turning it into a plush prison. And so on.

None of those young actors was exactly high profile before Runaways (Feliz is perhaps the best known, from a recurring role on MTV's Teen Wolf), but here they shine as kids struggling to come to terms with new truths about themselves -- superpowers, a telepathic link to a dinosaur, etc. -- and about their parents. Like the Pride, these children aren't a single-minded group. Faced with the prospect that their folks are more than likely murderers, some refuse to believe it, some search for more evidence, and others seek to contact the police, only to realize the Pride's influence is far-reaching.

Smartly written and tightly paced, Runaways coaxes the audience along with strong performances and one revelation after another, all while seeding the story with still more mysteries: Who, or what, is that withered man in Leslie Dean's care? How, and why, did Amy Minoru and the Hernandezes really die? What's the Pride actually plotting, and how does its ritual connect to the Wilders' construction project and the Yorkes' research? And, more importantly, what will its members do once they learn their children know their secret? Finding the answers will be well worth the price of a Hulu subscription.


The first three episodes of Marvel's Runaways debut Tuesday, Nov. 21, on Hulu. A new episode will follow each Tuesday.