Brittany Adebumola And Joseph David-Jones Say 'The 4400' Is 'A Beautiful Companion To The Original'

(CBS) - The CW welcomes The 4400 to its Monday night lineup starting October 25th at 9/8c. The 4400 stars Brittany Adebumola (as Shanice Murray) and Joseph David-Jones (as Jharrel Mateo) in a reboot of the 2004 series by the same name. In an instant, 4,400 missing people mysteriously return no idea where they were or how they haven't aged a day since their disappearance.

CBS' Matt Weiss spoke to Adebumola and David-Jones about their characters, the show as a whole and a good 'ol fashioned heist.

MW- Britany, Joseph, good to see you both! The 4400 comes to The CW this Monday, October 25th and first of all how excited are you both to be a part of this show and to be so close to the big premiere finally?

BA- I mean, it's a blessing. There's so many different and distinct characters in the show I just feel really blessed to be to be a part of it. Now to be able to watch it with everybody else will be so great because we get these scripts and we read it of course but you're laser focused on your own scenes so I'm going to be watching it along with the rest of the world with fresh eyes.

JDJ- I want to see everybody else's scenes, I'm super excited. I watched this show with my family as a kid so when they found out that I got this they were all proud and that made me proud. I've been crazy pumped about it and I feel super duper fortunate to be a part of it.

MW- What were some of your favorite things about the show watching it with your family, Joseph?

JDJ- It's funny because we love the sci-fi elements but I'm an extreme comic book nerd and I love the power aspect of this show. They still have that in this new series and we just take it to like another level  with a grounded layer of personality and character to it. It's a beautiful companion to the original. We do it justice a while fleshing out our own world.

MW- It's a bit of a double edged sword when you're reimagining a series like this because on one hand you have source material to go off of but you have to make it original as well. How has the show gone about balancing those two sides?

JDJ- It's funny we were just watching a video where someone was trying to break down our series as it related to the previous series. There are some alien elements within our series that are similar to the previous one but the main thing that we do justice to is the the sci-fi concept that they created. I feel like we've made this show our own though so I haven't really felt that much of a pull from the previous series.

MW- I'd love to hear more about your characters, Brittany who is Shanice Murray?

BA- So I play Shanice, she is a 26-year-old lawyer from Detroit. She is extremely driven, she's not afraid to take up space. She is very open about fighting for what she believes is right and fighting for her community. She's a career woman and we see her sort of balancing being a career woman while also nurturing this new life that she has.

First, she has a four-month-old daughter and motherhood doesn't really come that easy to her. The sacrifice that is required is something that we see her grapple with in the pilot. Of course she vanishes and reappears 16 years later and then her daughter is 16-years-old and her husband is remarried; it's a mess. She is trying to sort through the mess and just reconnect with her family while also advocating for the 4,400 using her legal wits.

MW- And Joseph who is Jharrel?

JDJ- He is a social worker from our time who is tasked with trying to uncover what has happened to these 4,400 people while also trying to help them reintegrate into society. There's a very human connection to the 4,400 that he has because his brother has gone missing.

It unraveled his life when he went missing and there were elements that are similar to what happened in the 4,400 to what happened to him. I guess that gives him a strong drive to figure out what is going on with these people and how he can help.

MW- We'll get out chance to meet both Shanice and Jharrel Monday night as an audience. What do you want the fans to know ahead of Monday?

JDJ- I think they should watch because this show has something for everybody. It has universal character drama, it has an amazing sci-fi concept, it has love triangles, it has comedy. We even have a heist!

BA- I was going to say there's a heist [laughs]. There really is something for everybody that I feel like people are really going to connect to it. I think people will connect to these characters in the show. We've put so much effort, love and work behind it that I know it's going to come across.

MW- You don't hear the word heist often enough these days, I'm sold just from that! Thank you both for the time and all the best moving forward.

BA- Take care!

JDJ- Thank you, man!

The 4400 premieres Monday night starting at 9/8c on The CW. Check your local listings for more information.