Archie Comics Take ‘Riverdale,’ ‘Frequency,’ ‘No Tomorrow’ Picked Up to Series at CW

Freshman drama ‘Containment’ will also not be back for a second season at The CW.

The CW is addressing the remaining holes on its 2016-17 schedule.

The younger-skewing network, which just picked up CBS’ Supergirl for a second season, has handed out series orders to Greg Berlanti’s Riverdale, a reboot of feature film Frequency and hourlong comedic drama No Tomorrow, The Hollywood Reporter has learned. Meanwhile, the network is also passing on a second season of Julie Plec’s Containment.

The four series join an already crowded slate at The CW, which is set to return every single scripted series from this season save for Containment and Beauty and the Beast, which is ending its run this summer.

Riverdale marks the latest drama at The CW for prolific producer Greg Berlanti.

Set in the present day and based on the iconic Archie Comics characters, Riverdale is a surprising and subversive take on Archie (K.J. Apa), Betty (Lili Reinhart, Surviving Jack), Veronica (Camila Mendes), Jughead Jones (Cole Sprouse, The Suite Life of Zack and Cody), Josie (Ashleigh Murray) and their friends, exploring the surrealism of small-town life — the darkness and weirdness bubbling beneath Riverdale’s wholesome facade. Luke Perry co-stars.

Considered a frontrunner from the start, the drama was originally developed at Fox before moving to The CW. Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa (Supergirl, Glee) penned the script and exec produces the Warner Bros. Television drama. Berlanti, a lifelong Archie fan and THR’s TV Producer of the Year, exec produces via his studio-based Berlanti Productions.

Riverdale gives Berlanti at least six shows on the 2016-17 schedule next season, with a potential seventh if NBC renews bubble drama Mysteries of Laura for a third season, and comes after The CW picked up Supergirl for a second season after corporate sibling CBS passed on a sophomore run.

No Tomorrow, from the team behind The CW’s Jane the Virgin, is based on a Brazilian format and follows a risk-averse, straight-arrow female procurement manager (Tori Anderson) at an Amazon-like distribution center who falls in love with a freewheeling man (Galavant’s Joshua Sasse) who lives life to the fullest. Together, they embark on a quest to fulfill their individual bucket lists with comedic and poignant results.

It marks the third hourlong comedic drama at The CW, joining previously renewed Jane the Virgin and Crazy Ex-Girlfriend. Jane’s Corinne Brinkerhoff penned the script. The drama, also like Jane, hails from CBS Television Studios and Electus, with Ben Silverman on board as an exec producer.

Frequency is a reimagining of the 2000 New Line Cinema film. In a twist from the feature, it centers on a female police detective (The Flash’s Peyton List) who in 2016 discovers she is able to speak via a ham radio with her estranged father (also a detective) who died in 1996. They forge a new relationship while working together on an unresolved murder case, but unintended consequences of the “butterfly effect” wreak havoc in the present day.

The show hails from Supernatural’s Jeremy Carver, with the film’s screenwriter, Toby Emmerich, also on board to exec produce alongside Carver, John Rickard and Lin Pictures’ Dan Lin and Jennifer Gwartz. The Warner Bros. Television series was originally developed for NBC during the 2014-15 season and co-stars Riley Smith (Nashville), Mekhi Phifer, Lenny Jacobson, Anthony Ruivivar, Devin Kelley and Daniel Bonjour.
What’s interesting about the three series pickups is that two are from Warner Bros. Television (three if you count Supergirl) and one from CBS Television Studios. The network, a joint partnership of CBS and Warner Bros., traditionally has a mandate to order an equal amount from each of their respective studios.

Containment, meanwhile, debuted in the awkward position of being The CW’s only series not already renewed for the 2016-17 season, with the network ordering more of its entire (relatively small) lineup before the drama bowed. Ratings-wise, it also has been kind of a shrug — especially considering how valuable and rare free real estate on the No. 5 network is. With time-shifting not yet available, all there is to go is the same-day scores: a 0.5 rating among adults 18-49 and 1.7 million viewers for the premiere. An adaptation of Belgian series Cordon, it does come from network favorite Plec. But the executive producer has already seen The Vampire Diaries and The Originals renewed and has a pilot at Fox (Recon) with frequent collaborator Kevin Williamson, though the latter is considered unlikely to go to series. Williamson’s CW pilot, meanwhile, will be redeveloped and is not moving forward at this time.