'Off the Map' Creator Jenna Bans: Hawaii's 'Lost' Locations Were a 'Perfect Fit' with video

As ABC’s iconic Lost came to an end, Jenna Bans saw an opportunity.

The creator of Off the Map, a South America-set medical drama/action-adventure series premiering Wednesday, thought Lost’s Hawaii locations would be the “perfect fit” for an idea she’d been kicking around about a Doctors Without Borders-type medical series set in the jungle.

“The genesis [for Off the Map] came at the same time as Lost was ending,” she said Monday at the Television Critics Association press stop of the Hawaii sets that would be up for grabs once the mystery drama concluded.

“It was a no-brainer to set it down there,” said Bans of Off the Map, which stars Caroline Dhavernas (Wonderfalls), Zach Gilford (Friday Night Lights) and Mamie Gummer (The Good Wife) as young doctors who enlist for work at a medical clinic set in the tropics.

“The jungle is their pharmacy, their medicine cabinet,” said Bans, whose credits include producing Shonda Rhimes’ medical dramas Private Practice and Grey’s Anatomy.

“[The location] allows us to delve into stories other shows wouldn’t necessarily do.”

“So many docs in this country consider working in a hospital or in private practices as their day job and their passion is going out to these places — often South America — and working with a medical system that’s not as advanced as ours,” Bans said of setting the series in a fictional South America location.”