Edshugeo The GodMoor

I think I spelled that wrong. Whatever. Anyway, here's Frank Miller on video discussing his work in progress, Holy Terror, Batman! Looks good. Look at the size of those pages, though. I love Miller, and probably would've stopped reading comics in 1980 or so if not for him. Actually, I did for a minute, I think. His stuff often looks like it could be drawn with Sharpie markers on 8 1/2 x 11 copy paper. Not sayin' that's bad, just that he makes it look that easy.
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Unconfirmed reports at Aint it Cool News about Keanu Reeves possibly playing the Silver Surfer and Yuen Wo-Ping directing an Ang Lee film production of Shang Chi (Master Of Kung Fu) got me thinking about ideas I used to have about about these characters.

First, let me start with Spiderman. I never thought a faithful adaptation of Spiderman could work, but it did, and the first two Sam Raimi films were great. Before he proved me wrong, I had this bizarre concept of Peter Parker being a Haitian-American student played by Will Smith (who basically has Spiderman's personality down) who goes through the traditional origin and then becomes a modern day incarnation of one of his ancestral gods, Anansie, which is what Spiderman basically is. Anansie/Edshu to Brer Rabbit to Bugs Bunny to Spiderman to assorted loudmouthed, charismatic black wiseguys popular in Hollywood cinema today.
I understand that to some, that's possibly the worst idea they will ever hear. Anansie, however is a god in the form of a spider and sometimes spider-man. He predates Marvel's character by possibly thousands of years and is therefore public domain. Somebody is gonna eventually exploit this idea if Marvel itself doesn't do what they've already done with their other spider-related franchises from Spider-Woman to Arana, and get there first.

Where was I? Okay. The Surfer and MOKF.

Lee and Kirby reunited (with Joe Sinnot) near the end of the seventies to produce a graphic novel (not so-called, if I remember the times correctly) which remains among my favorite comics of all time. This is close to equaling a Beatles reunion (not the one that produced Free As A Bird, though). I recall that at some point (late 70's, very early 80's?) a movie based on this book was considered. A musical with a prominent role for Olivia Newton John, but still, I was excited. Never happened. I still consider this story the only one featuring the Surfer and Galactus that matters. The Fantastic Four "trilogy" where the stretchy guy scares the big guy off with that little gun? Nope. Liked it when I first read it, but... nope.

The only place where my ideas veer off a bit is that Zenn La is not Norrin Ladd's home. Norrin, the Surfer is a figure created wholly from Galatus' subconcious. Sorta like the angel that sits on a person's right shoulder in those old cartoons. His memories of home are actually those of his host, Galactus. Everytime Galactus comes across an inhabited world, he does battle with himself, because in spite of what he says, he knows there's not that much difference between him and his food.

Master Of Kung Fu was an attempt to cash in on Bruce Lee by having a martial arts hero be related to Fu Manchu. I dunno, is that kinda like having Luke Cage be related to Rochester from the old Jack Benny show? Dude's name was Shang Chi and he wore the same red pajamas all the time and hung out with some British folks who were trying to take down his father. Now, I'm not Chinese, but I have a feeling this wouldn't play that well in Beijing, Hong Kong or even Taiwan. Still, it might be cool. I know Yuen's not gonna actually direct the film. They'll have him do the action (at most) and let some hack do the rest.

Had an idea for the comicbook, that Fu Shang-Chi was working for his father all along or at least for the organization that he would eventually inherit. The series would pit him against Nick Fury who would always be a step behind the son of Fu.

Labels: comics, fun, kung fu, movies