Marvel’s Runaways Talk Cloak & Dagger Crossover
We talked to the cast and creators of Marvel's Runaways about the upcoming crossover with Cloak & Dagger.
Fans of Marvel comics have been itching for a Marvel’s Runaways and Marvel’s Cloak and Dagger crossover ever since these two TV adaptations first hit the screen seven months apart (in November 2017 and June 2018, respectively). Finally, in Runaways Season 3, which hits Hulu in December, we’ll get our wish: Tandy and Tyrone are coming to Los Angeles for a Cloak & Dagger/Runaways crossover event.
Earlier this month, we had a chance to talk the cast and creators of Marvel’s Runaways at NYCC about what we can expect from the very special episode.
“We’ve actually been asking Jeph [Loeb, VP of Marvel TV] if we could do it since day one,” said showrunner Josh Schwartz. “Literally like ringing his doorbell, [asking], ‘This year?'”
What changed this year? There was a storyline that made sense, for one.
“We had a storyline, in terms of Nico’s journey, that synced up with some of the stuff that Cloak [aka Tandy] has been wrestling with.” Cloak and Dagger Season 2, which saw Tandy considering vengeance over justice in her encounters with a sex trafficking ring, ended in May with a finale that saw Tandy and Tyrone leaving New Orleans to see if they might be able to use their superpowers to help people in other parts of the country.
When Runaways Season 3 ended last December, our teenage found family was split up. When Season 3 picks up, Chase, Gert, and Karolina will still be separated from the rest of their friends. Season 3 will see Nico exploring the dark realm and meeting its ruler Morgan le Fay, played by Elizabeth Hurley.
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“Cloak and Dagger comes to the Runaways to help us rescue one of our very own,” teased Lyrica Okana, who plays Nico.
Of course, bringing characters from another show onto your show isn’t just about merging the casts, but also about merging the disparate tones and narrative elements from the respective shows.
“I think it was really fun to see our two worlds coming together,” said Minoru, “and seeing how they deal with their special powers and how the special effects is done on their show, that being brought to our show. We have a certain way of how our dialogue is written and then they have their own way. So seeing that and working through that together was really, really fun.”
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Tandy and Tyrone represent two more things for the Runaways, who have pretty much been in reaction mode since they first found out about their villainous parents and their own superpowers, to deal with.
“At first, the six Runaways were dealing with their superpowers,” said Gregg Sulkin, who plays Chase. “Then, they embraced being superheroes and now the minute they’re settled is the minute that now two more superheroes have to come into the equation and mess everything up.”
In other words, the introduction is not going to go seamlessly. While viewers may know that all of these kids are alright, the characters in these shows have no reason to trust each other.
“There’s definitely going to be some friction,” teased Sulkin, “which I think is great for the show cause I think it adds a lot comedy.”
“They’re not sort of willing participants at first,” said Schwartz. “I mean, at first, Nico and [Tyrone] don’t see eye to eye on some of these things.”
Runaways is an ensemble, which means not every character will react the same way to the introduction of Tyrone and Tandy.
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“I think [Alex]’s surprised,” said Rhenzy Feliz, who plays Alex. “[He’s] excited to know that there are other teenagers that are good people at heart, trying to help. I like the banter that they have, that we all have. We don’t know who these people are. They don’t know who we are. What the hell is going on? Who are you? What can you do? Like, what are your powers? That kind of thing. It’s a lot of fun dialogue we’ve got to play with.”
It won’t just be the Runaways crew who reacts in diverse ways to the introduction of Tyrone and Tandy, it sounds like Tyrone and Tandy will have different reactions to the many members of the Runaways.
“It’s really cool to see how their powers kind of compliment ours,” said Virginia Gardner, who plays Karolina. “Some characters bond more with other ones, and it’s kind of cool to see how those dynamics come into play, and then you know, kind of ends on a note where there’s definitely an open door to do more crossovers in the future, which was awesome.”
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Ariela Barer, who plays Gert, said the crossover will take Runaways “fully into superhero mode,” but that her character will not be as into it as some of the others.
“We’re fully doing it all,” said Barer. “Their powers mixed with our powers is really intense and the interesting thing about that is that Gert is in the opposite place. Gert’s like, ‘I want none of this.’ So, that was a really fun thing to do. Just not be on the same page as anyone.”
And, yes, Tyrone and Tandy get to meet Old Lace, Gert’s dinosaur companion. “It’s fun,” teased Barer. “I can’t really say much more beyond that, but Old Lace is part of the Runaways. She’s one of us.”
“We wanted to do all that fun stuff,” said Schwartz of the dino introduction. “Our kids don’t know that there’s any other kids out there like them and neither do Cloak and Dagger. So it’s that first encounter of like, wait, there’s other kids like us and you guys have a dinosaur? So we definitely want to make sure that they get to have the experience any fan would have walking into the hostel and meeting all those characters.”
Loeb said that the relative superhero isolation the Runaways and Cloak & Dagger feel is a heightened version of the way teenagers often feel.
“We don’t do this often and we don’t, particularly with the kids, play it very publicly,” said Loeb. “There’s nobody that’s stepping out in front of a camera saying, ‘I am Iron Man.’ And so the idea of them running into each other really became something that we could have a lot of fun with in the sense that, again, every kid, at some point, feels like, ‘I’m the only one feels like this,’ and being able to take that and use that as sort of the body of how these six kids and then these two other kids now suddenly realize, ‘Oh, we’re not that different.’ And then that opens the door for us to be able to ask the question: Who else is out there that might be like us? And do they need our help or are they doing it just fine, and do we need to learn from them?”
“You know, I think this episode is for [the comic book fans], to be honest,” reflected Sulkin. “I know Jeph always talks about the importance of giving back to the Marvel community and I think this one is a ‘Thank you for watching the show’ sort of episode.”
Marvel’s Runaways Season 3 drops on December 13th on Hulu.
Kayti Burt is a staff editor covering books, TV, movies, and fan culture at Den of Geek. Read more of her work here or follow her on Twitter @kaytiburt.
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Kayti is a pop culture writer, editor, and full-time nerd who comes from a working class background. A member of the Television Critics Association, she specializes…