Justin Hartley is moving deeper into the prestige-network-drama development lane with A Forgotten Kill, an ABC crime series the actor and former This Is Us lead is executive producing through his Change Up Productions banner. Diana Son is writing the pilot, Ken Olin is attached to direct, and 20th Television is producing under its standing ABC overall deal.
The series is based on Isabella Maldonado’s 2024 crime novel, the latest in the bestselling Daniela Vega FBI investigator series the author has been publishing since 2020. The Daniela Vega books have together moved more than 2.2 million copies across hardback, digital and audio editions, and the FBI-procedural format slots cleanly into the ABC primetime lineup the network has spent two years rebuilding around case-of-the-week material. Deadline reported the project is one of two ABC crime-drama pilots ordered to script for the 2026-27 development cycle.
Hartley’s Change Up Productions has been quietly building a development slate at 20th Television since 2023, the year Disney consolidated the Hartley deal under the studio’s umbrella following his Tracker run on CBS. The Tracker procedural, in which Hartley starred and which he executive produced, has been the network’s most-watched scripted drama for three consecutive seasons and was renewed earlier this year for season four through 2027. The Movie Blog reported the ABC ordering pattern positions A Forgotten Kill for a likely 2027-28 midseason launch, with Hartley not expected to take an on-screen role.
Son, the playwright and television writer whose work has run through Law & Order: Criminal Intent, House and Power Book II: Ghost, has been tied to the project since the initial 20th Television option in March. Olin’s directing credits include the recent Apple TV+ Pachinko, NBC’s This Is Us, and the original Thirtysomething ensemble that put him on the map. The combination of Son and Olin is the kind of writer-director pair the network has been using to anchor its premium-tier crime-drama development.
The development cycle also lands inside a broader Hollywood corporate moment. The cleared Paramount-Warner Bros. Discovery merger, which we covered when the DOJ approved the transaction without conditions, has sharpened the network competition for high-pedigree development slots. ABC, owned by Disney, has been a notable beneficiary of the post-merger reshuffling, with 20th Television actively poaching from the Paramount-Warner combined operations through this spring.
Maldonado, the former police officer turned bestselling novelist, has been on a six-book contract with Thomas & Mercer since 2019 and recently extended that deal through 2030. She is co-attached to the project as a consulting producer, with veto authority on FBI-procedural detail, an unusually granular contractual arrangement that 20th Television has used twice before, most recently on the David Simon-led HBO Max Hospice limited series.
For Hartley specifically, the development position represents his continued migration from on-camera star to executive producer of the formats he has historically appeared in. His This Is Us run from 2016 to 2022 made him a primetime presence, and the subsequent CBS Tracker green-light established the development-arm-and-acting-arm dual-track that has become a Hollywood-A-list pattern over the past five years. A Forgotten Kill is his third executive-producer credit in 12 months.
ABC has not yet confirmed a casting timeline, but industry trackers are pointing to a writers’ room opening in late July, with the pilot tentatively scheduled to shoot in February 2027. The series enters the 2026-27 development cycle alongside the network’s other recently-ordered drama, an as-yet-untitled Shonda Rhimes-affiliated medical procedural also produced under the 20th Television banner.
