Sci-Fi Bulletin: Exploring the Universes of SF, Fantasy, Horror and Spy-fi!

Cress Williams, Nafessa Williams and China Anne McLain have been cast as the members of the Pierce family at the heart of Greg Berlanti, Mara Brock Akil and Salim Akil’s new CW superhero pilot, Black Lightning.

Cress Williams plays Jefferson Pierce, who gave up his role as Black Lightning many years earlier and is now a teacher – but now finds that his younger daughter Jennifer, played by China McLain, (described as an “independent, outspoken scholar-athlete with a wild streak of her own”) is hellbent on justice and a star student is being recruited by a local gang which means he has to return as the vigilante. Nafessa Williams will play the older Pierce daughter, Anissa: “passionate and quick-witted, Jefferson’s twenty-something daughter balances the demands of medical school with her job teaching part-time at her father’s school.” In the DC comics universe, both girls go on to be superheroes in their own right – Thunder and Lightning.