ABC Talks The Future Of Marvel Shows, The Failure Of 'Inhumans' [TCA 2018]

Channing Dungey, President of ABC Entertainment, spoke with reporters about the future of Marvel on the network after her executive session with the Television Critics Association. Even though both ABC and Marvel are owned by Disney, ABC faces competition for Marvel shows from Netflix, Hulu and other networks.

"We continue to be very excited about what they're doing with S.H.I.E.L.D.," Dungey said. "We've tried a few things that haven't worked out as well as we would have liked. We developed a couple things this season that we don't think are going to end up going forward, so we're going to look really carefully about what we do next. The idea for us is to come up with something that works very well for both Marvel and ABC, so we're going to continue to try. They are definitely going to have a presence on the DTC and then what their relationship with Netflix is or how long that will last is not a question for me to answer. I actually don't know."

The DTC is the direct to consumer streaming service Disney is launching. There will be original programming available alongside material from ABC and other Disney properties on the service.

"We have had some conversations about it," Dungey said. "It is more through ABC Studios because they're the content provider. [We] are in lots of conversations about the things that make sense for DTC vs. for us. It's an ongoing conversation for everyone."

Dungey remained positive on Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., currently in its fifth season, which will hit the 100 episode mark soon. While she has not committed, a sixth season sounds likely.

"The creative this season, I honestly think is the strongest that it's ever been," Dungey said. "We've been really excited about what the producers have been talking about for the second half of the season. I'm really looking forward to hearing them come in and talk about what their ideas would be for the season 6 so we can make a better determination about whether we're going to order another season or not."

The exec admitted that the performance of Marvel's Inhumans disappointed. While she would not confirm it is cancelled, she was decidedly noncommittal about a second season.

"It didn't perform for us at the level we would've wanted," Dungey said. "We haven't made any official decisions yet about what we're going to pick up in May, but I will say that the numbers unfortunately were less exciting for us than we'd hoped they would be. Not saying anything officially at this point."

Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. airs Friday nights on ABC.