More than three years into her relationship, Kai Soremekun had a knife before her, her boyfriend’s hand on the handle. The emotional abuse had gone too far, and she needed to get out.

“I had such a low self-worth at that point,” Soremekun told me. “When I finally got out, I spent a lot of time realizing how that happened.”

That process of soul-searching led to several different scripts, most of which were tough-girl narratives stemming more from her anger than from a fully matured artistic sensibility. They were “more a self-healing tool than something I should make,” she said.

Eventually she wrote a story of empowerment with the right tone and plot. The result is Chick, a new web series Soremekun self-financed premiering today on web series network Koldcast.tv and RowdyOrbit, a new site distributing web series by and about people of color.

In the series, Lisa leaves her loser boyfriend to pursue loftier dreams. She hears about a secret academy that trains superheroes, and the story progresses from there. While obviously a narrative of female empowerment, Soremekun does not want to scare off men; she wanted to story to have multiple layers.

“I’m not a fan of ‘oh woe is me, I’m a woman; oh woe is me, I’m a black woman,’” she said. Society has real problems, she added, but she’s optimistic things are getting better.

Right now, seven episodes are planned, but the show has additional content, including an equal number of vlogs from the protagonist and an ARG (alternative reality game) to further engage viewers. All these different threads, Soremekun promises, will eventually converge.

Her plans do not stop there. She’s working on a social networking site to house her productions, with two in the works, including a possible Chick spin-off.

The director has tread a long, winding career path, from her early years as a dancer to her stint as a series regular on a short-lived Fox show, Medicine Ball, and finally from film school to the web series market. For her, the future is on the web.

“It gives the artist the opportunity to pursue their work without a studio or network,” she said. “I really wanted to explore a way to express myself creatively where I had more control.”