Todd McFarlane gives an Update on his new SPAWN Movie
Comments(10)
- By drvenkman
Todd McFarlane’s ‘Spawn’ is just one of those stories and comic books that could use a pretty damn good movie. I hated the live-action movie that was done, it was absolutely awful! It should have been done so much better, what a waste. The HBO animated series on the other hand was pretty freakin’ awesome though! I don’t know if any of you have seen them or not but you should definitely check it out. I believe it was on the air for three seasons.
I’m one of those guys that has been waiting in anticipation for a new Spawn movie to get off the ground whether it is animated or live-action it is something that needs to be done right. Todd McFarlane recently talked with the folks at IESB and he revealed where the movie stands at this point, and here is what he has to say:
“Right now I literally have five offers on the table. Everything from the big studios, and the big budgeted production with a lot of special effects. To where I’m leaning which is actually sort of a smaller budget. Just keep it down, keep it dark, Keep it grungy. I mean, I’ve got two teenage daughters, and I’m trying to come up with an idea that I’ve been living with for ten years, that would actually get them and their dates to go to it, and it’s not a comic book movie, it’s just a scary movie, a creepy movie. It happens to have… everythings real, except for one element which happens to be the character we know as Spawn. So it’s not going to be a super villain verses a superhero or anything like that stuff. It’s just gonna be a tight movie. Think of ‘Departed’ with something sort of moving in the shadows a little bit.”
I have heard him talk about an idea like this before, so it looks like this is the kind of story he is going to stick with. I like the idea. it sounds like it will be more of a Sam and Twitch horror detective movie rather than a full blown Spawn flick. If he goes that route, Spawn lurking in the shadows and taking out people could be pretty damn cool. McFarlane then goes on to why he wants to go the low budget route.
“The guys are getting restless, going ‘Todd you gotta get your boys in here one way or the other’, and they want to know whats going on. The problem is if it goes big they’re only gonna let me produce it. If I go smaller they’ll let me write and direct it. I gotta get it down small enough, which is the idea I’ve had, which basically keeps the budget small enough. Or there just gonna go get a a schmuck director, and I go, well hold on a sec, I’ll be the schmuck then, and let me go on.”
So the ultimate selling point for McFarlane making a new Spawn movie is the fact that he want’s full creative power. He wants to write, direct, and produce. I have no idea what kind of a director he would be, but it looks like the only way this is all going to go down is if he gets what he wants. So I guess we will find out sooner or later how good of a film director Todd McFarlane can be.
Source: IESB
The first spawn movie wasn’t terrible, the special effects weren’t great but it seemed to stick pretty damn close to the source material. The only thing that was missing was the ticking clock.
I think he should let spawn be a comic hero, people go to see comic book movies what they shun are these well we gotta make it realistic pieces of art trash folks try to make based on a character they grew up reading and watching either after school or saturday morning.
Give spawn a polish like they did spidey, let him do his ghoulish and demonic anti hero best and his daughters would go see it. Spawn was wolverine with magic powers, a cape and sabertooths claws instead of in the wrist claws. Allow him to be his bloody best, let him go ahead and be mystical and magical that isn’t what sank the first spawn movie the fact that it wasn’t as crisp as you wanted it to be and well the ending kinda sucked. I mean wow you “win” at the end of the first movie, that shit took years to build up to and you end it all in one flick.
That was the problem with spawn one
I am going to have to respectfully disagree with you on that one Primal. I was actually very dissapointed by the first film. It felt too “comic bookish” to me. I love the realistic comic book movies (Dark Knight) it makes it feel like this could happen. I like this approach that Todd is going. I just have no idea if he is a good director.
Yeah, the film was dreadful. I hated it in theaters and was on spike tv recently and I couldn’t even watch it. But the animated series was pretty dope, and McFarlane has been talking about the Sam and Twitch-oriented “Se7en with demons” for a long time… but I don’t know if he should really direct it. I mean, please, by all means, give him total creative control, but I don’t think he has any directing experience, I can’t see giving him that title being a good idea.
i hated john lequizamo in it. i wanted to punch his throat
some, maybe a shot of violator was good in the movie. the effects, that is. but it already feels like a dark movie. like a dirty shirt with sand and rocks in it. the two cop angle, might be interesting. but it’d have to be quite one hell of a story to make a big audience want to watch two cops in a super hero movie. watchmen suffered from that misleading superhero thing also with the audience. any one i talked to who hadn’t read the comic wasn’t expecting those suites to be that kind of movie.
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i truly hated the first ’spawn’ movie. it was a total waste of two hours of my life that i’ll never get back!
i am glad macfarlane wants complete creative control. ’spawn’ was one of the best animated series i’ve ever seen. furthermore, a big budget studio = big expectations for numbers. i feel like a studio like fox would sacrifice the integrity of the material so that it can have a lower PG-13 rating in order to get numbers up. i mean, if you need evidence, look at what they did to ‘wolverine’. i haven’t seen too many dark comics that do well under a PG-13 rating–’the dark knight’ being the only exception(and even so, that was a pretty large body count for a PG-13 flick).
letting fox studios lay claim to ’spawn’ will be as misguided as casting keanu reeves as ‘constantine’….woah.
Spawn failed like daredevil, elecktra, and the punisher failed because of Terrible Acting . spawn is blood gore evil and all sorts of nastiness thats why the series was so good if u can get actors to carry these qualities over the screen u got urself a movie
agreed
i like what he is saying. because who would guarantee its a great move but the creator of the series. instead of getting some one to come in that only cares about making a huge amount of money off of it.