FX’s Y: The Last Man comic book adaptation has recruited Eliza Clark to serve as its new showrunner. Written by by Brian K. Vaughan and illustrated by Pia Guerra (among others) from 2002-2008, the original Y: The Last Man comics tell the story of Yorick Brown, the last man alive in a post-apocalyptic future after a mysterious plague wipes out every other human possessing a Y chromosome. New Line spent years trying to get a Y: The Last Man movie off the ground and had names like D.J. Caruso (Disturbia) and Dan Trachtenberg (10 Cloverfield Lane) attached to direct at different points in time, but their efforts ultimately failed to pan out.
Finally, in 2015, FX started developing a Y: The Last Man TV show and ordered its pilot to series three years later, with Michael Green (American Gods) and Aïda Mashaka Croal (Luke Cage) serving as its showrunners. Unfortunately, the series hit an unexpected snag this past April, when Green and Croal announced their departure over creative differences with FX about the show “in its current form”. Now, it appears that Y: The Last Man is getting back on-track with a brand-new showrunner at the helm.
THR is reporting that Clark has been tapped to serve as the new showrunner on Y: The Last Man, filling Green and Croal’s former spot. The writer-producer has previously worked on genre series like TNT’s family crime-drama Animal Kingdom and the Halle Berry-led sci-fi thriller Extant. FX original programming president Nick Grad praised Clark in a statement, saying that her “ambitious vision for [Y: The Last Man] will only enhance the mystique and allure of this powerful story”.
Barry Keoghan (Dunkirk) is playing Yorick in Y: The Last Man, with Diane Lane (House of Cards), Lashana Lynch (Captain Marvel), Imogen Poots (Green Room), and Amber Tamblyn (Girlfriend’s Day) among those filling out the rest of the series’ ensemble. Insecure veteran Melina Matsoukas called the shots on the pilot episode and will continue to serve as an executive producer on the series alongside Clark and Color Force’s Nina Jacobson and Brad Simpson.
In an interview with THR in late 2017, Vaughan said that Green won him over with his pitch for the Y: The Last Man series, and described it as being heavily focused on toxic masculinity - something which he felt was “very relevant”, but also different from the comics in a way that’s “exciting and audacious”. It’s not altogether clear yet exactly which part of Green and Croal’s vision for the show didn’t match up with FX’s, but the hope is that Clark will carry that particularly timely theme over, and otherwise aspire to be equally ambitious in the way she adapts and updates Y’s source material for TV. FX’s original programming has become increasingly known for being artistically daring and ground-breaking in recent years (thanks to TV shows like Atlanta, Legion, and Pose, to name just a few), so hopefully that tradition will continue on here.
Y: The Last Man does not have a premiere date yet.
Source: THR
