- Box Office Bomb: The theatrical release that was done to promote the series made just under $3 million on its opening weekend — globally. Most screenings of the show dried up after the opening weekend due to an unexpected addition to the IMAX schedule, which is detailed below. If anything, it's likely that the IMAX presentation hurt the show's ratings due to poor reception.
- Creator Killer: The failure of the series was more or less the beginning of the end of Marvel Television as a separate entity from Marvel Studiosnote . Combined with the billion-dollar success of the films Black Panther (2018), Captain Marvel (2019)note and especially the one-two punch of Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame, Disney did some more corporate restructuring in 2019 and made Marvel Television a subsidiary of Marvel Studios, with the later announcement that Marvel Television would stop producing future series once it had completed production of its then-current projects
. - Dueling Works:
- Strictly talking about IMAX releases, there was an unlikely match-up: the first two episodes of Inhumans against It (2017), which came out a week later. Inhumans was doing so poorly for IMAX and It was tracking so well that many screenings of Inhumans were outright cancelled to make room for more screenings of It. The Stephen King adaptation brought in a $7 million opening weekend just stateside (as part of a much larger $123 million opening weekend), more than doubling what Inhumans made around the world. To add insult to injury, Inhumans was filmed with IMAX cameras in some sequences and was explicitly brought to theaters that used the format during what the company imagined was going to be a slow month for them otherwise, while It was a last-minute conversion done in response to the film tracking well before it had a record-breaking release.
- With The Gifted (2017), which is unsurprising given the latter has ties with the X-Men movies and Marvel had been promoting the Inhumans as a substitute for the X-Men at the time due to the latter faction's film rights being with 20th Century Fox. The Gifted ultimately garnered a better critical reception than this one and had better viewership.
- Dyeing for Your Art: Serinda Swan did actually have her hair shaved for the TV show.
- Executive Meddling: If rumors are true, then this is the only reason that the show even exists.
- Marvel Entertainment CEO Ike Perlmutter really wanted an Inhumans adaptation (or more accurately; really, really wanted to devalue the X-Men franchise), and wanted a major project to bring them into a live-action format. Supposedly, Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige was never actually that interested in the Inhumans franchise in the first place, while Perlmutter wanted to use the franchise as a way of phasing out the X-Men (whose film rights were tied up with 20th Century Fox).
- However, Feige was interested in making Black Panther (2018) and Captain Marvel (2019) — works which Perlmutter was apprehensive about greenlighting for not having a White Male Lead.note To compromise, Feige agreed to an Inhumans movie at the end of Phase 3 in exchange for Perlmutter agreeing to Black Panther and Captain Marvel.
- However, after Marvel Studios gained autonomy from Marvel Entertainment (something that happened during the pre-production woes of Captain America: Civil War, where Perlmutter attempted to kick Robert Downey Jr. out of the cast due to a pay dispute), the Inhumans movie was pushed back multiple times, and was eventually removed from the schedule altogether (as, reportedly, Kevin Feige and the other producers at Marvel Studios didn't have that much passion for the property, and decided that no adaptation would be better than a half-hearted adaptation). Perlmutter didn't take this sitting down and chose to greenlight — and subsequently rush — a show for ABC.
- Friday Night Death Slot: Was set from day one to premiere on TV in this timeslot, possibly indicating the level of ABC's confidence in it.
- Playing with Character Type: Iwan Rheon's most famous role is that of the Bastard Bastard Ramsay Snow on Game of Thrones, a violent, sadistic backstabber that's one of the worst villains on a show with no shortage of them. Maximus is also a backstabbing, scheming Evil Prince who seeks to take the throne from his brother, but is a Visionary Anti-Villainnote whose actions are driven by a sincere devotion to his people.
- Quietly Cancelled: The series wound up premiering to abysmal critical scores and horrific ratings after a disastrous Comic-Con presentation and early screening for IMAX. Combined with all this and the numerous behind the scenes troubles involving Marvel Television and their frustration at Marvel Studios having been cut off from them by Disney (after one too many instances of Executive Meddling), and with no word of renewal when the series ended in December of 2017, lead star Anson Mount being released from his contract so he could join the main cast of Star Trek: Discovery, and the announcement that Disney was buying Fox (who had the X-Men and Fantastic Four film rights, hence why the series even existed), the show was subjected to this trope in March of 2018. Little, if any parties at all, were surprised by this considering the circumstances, especially since a Continuity Reboot is in the works.
- Real Life Writes the Plot: This series was the real life. As it gave Hawaii a horrible first impression of Marvel Cinematic Universe productions, Marvel Studios has reportedly stipulated that the state is not an option for future MCU projects, as they're either Persona Non Grata there or too embarrassed to be willing to show up. This meant Eternals, a film primarily shot on location because of the potential for Scenery Porn that Hawai'i would have been perfect for, couldn't have scenes set on the islands.
- Saved from Development Hell: Originally announced a movie for the MCU's Phase 3 plans in 2014, progress on the project stalled and it was eventually taken off the schedule indefinitely, though Kevin Feige said it was likely to happen in some form regardless. The movie was reworked into a television series instead, largely out of spite from Ike Perlmutter due to not getting the Inhumans movie he wanted, as well as losing control over the film side of Marvel Studios.
- What Could Have Been:
- As mentioned above, the television series was originally intended to be a movie. Joe Robert Cole (currently the co-writer for Black Panther) had even written a first draft of the script back in 2014, but left the project once it was removed from the schedule. In the original film schedule, the Inhumans would have been released after Avengers: Infinity War, instead of Ant-Man and the Wasp. Screen Rant considers that the likely project was to introduce the Inhumans in Infinity War before their solo film, as Spider-Man and Black Panther were introduced in Civil War. Thanos and the Black Order would have attacked Attilan, as in The Avengers (Jonathan Hickman), to retrieve one of the infinity stones, and their solo film would have been set in the aftermath of Thanos' attack. The project was scrapped when Kevin Feige, having enough of Marvel's constant Executive Meddling, got Disney to split Marvel Studios away from its parent company, and thus canceled the filmnote shortly after the split.
- Mark Brooks made some unused concept art for the series, including a much more impressive and comic accurate design for Auran.
- Plans existed for a second season, but the show's very poor reception led ABC to quietly cancel the show in 2018.
- As mentioned above, the television series was originally intended to be a movie. Joe Robert Cole (currently the co-writer for Black Panther) had even written a first draft of the script back in 2014, but left the project once it was removed from the schedule. In the original film schedule, the Inhumans would have been released after Avengers: Infinity War, instead of Ant-Man and the Wasp. Screen Rant
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