Todd McFarlane Says ‘Spawn’ Reboot Will Be “Dark, R-Rated” If It Ever Happens
Todd McFarlanehas been talking about rebootingSpawnfor the big screensince as far back as 2009. At one time he was touting the attachment of an Oscar-winning actor who kept bugging him about the script, and eventually it was determined that actor was probablyJamie Foxx. At the time,The Amazing Spider-Man 2star himself said that he was “aggressively pursuing” the lead role in the comic book adaptation, but three more years have gone by and nothing has happened. Now Todd McFarlane is again talking about the kind ofSpawnmovie he wants to make, and he has some concept art this time. Find out more after the jump.
The creator of one of the most popular independent comic books of all time appeared on Kevin Smith’s AMC showGeeking Outwhere he addressed the status of theSpawnreboot. McFarlane confirms that the film has made some progress, and that he’s written a “dark, R-rated, scary, badass sort of script.” He also show off this one image of concept art:
ComicBook.comhad an exclusive clip fromGeeking Out, and they also reference an interview they had with McFarlane back in February where he explained how this iteration ofSpawnfrom the previous film adaptation back in 1997:
While that sounds somewhat interesting (and the concept art of “the ghost” above looks cool), this isn’t much different from what McFarlane has been saying for the past seven years.Back in 2009he said this:
“It’s not a comic book movie, it’s just a scary movie, a creepy movie. Everything’s real except for one element, which happens to be the character we know as Spawn. So it’s not going to be super villain vs superhero or any of that stuff, it’s just going to be a ‘tight’ movie.”
Then again in 2011, he had this to say:
I suppose what’s encouraging about this is that Todd McFarlane hasn’t changed his vision for aSpawnmovie in all these years. However, he also previously said that his writing and directing the feature film adaptation was a non-negotiable term when it comes to getting the film off the ground, and I can’t imagine a major studio allowing that to happen.
Honestly, I’m not sure this is the best approach toSpawn. While I respect McFarlane’s viewpoint as the creator of the property, I thinkSpawnneeds the stunning visuals that bring the pages of the comic to life. With technology nowadays,Spawndoesn’t need to wear a rubber suit like Michael Jai White did in the 1997 film. Visual effects now easily allow for something stylized in the same vein asSin CityorWatchmen. But since no one is clamoring for aSpawnmovie, I don’t think a studio will spend much money to bring it to life unless it’s something that will appeal greatly to general audiences. But maybe I’m wrong.
Whatever McFarlane does, it can’t be worse than the 1997 adaptation, which now has some seriously dated visual effects (which were state of the art at the time). Here’s a modern trailer put together by a fan for the movie:
Anyone out there still interested in a newSpawnmovie?
