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Marvel is looking to expand the vast Marvel Cinematic Universe with its upcoming quartet of series that will air exclusively on Netflix. Former journalist and television veteran Cheo Hodari Coker has been named as the executive producer for the Luke Cage series and will also serve as its showrunner.

Marvel made the announcement Tuesday (Mar. 31) that it was giving the coveted position to Hoker. In addition to his executive duties, Hoker will also write the first two episodes of Luke Cage, which is set to debut sometime in 2016.

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Most recently, Coker served as a co-executive producer on the second season of “Ray Donovan,” and prior to that was a supervising producer on the critically-acclaimed, fourth season of the drama “SouthLAnd.” Coker was a part of the “SouthLAnd” team that earned the show a 2012 Peabody Award. Coker also garnered a 2013 NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Writing for a Dramatic Series for his work on that show.

Coker’s feature film credits include Fox Searchlight’s rap biopic “Notorious.” He authored the book “Unbelievable: The Life, Death, and Afterlife of The Notorious B.I.G.” as well. Coker started his writing career in journalism and was a staff writer at the Los Angeles Times and contributed to VIBE, Rolling Stone, Essence, among other publications. He is a graduate of Stanford University.

Mike Colter will play the lead role in Marvel’s Luke Cage. Colter has previously starred in The Good Wife and American Horror Story: Coven. The Luke Cage character will be introduced first in the A.K.A. Jessica Jones series from Marvel.

Photo: Marvel