During most of the ’00s, Marvel licensed out its various characters to different studios to produce films based on its properties. This began with New Line Cinema’s ‘Blade’ which blew away expectations and was eventually blossomed into a trilogy. This was quickly followed by Fox’s ‘X-Men’ and Sony’s ‘Spider-Man’. These were so popular that soon every studio was cranking out Marvel movies. Some were… well better than others.
‘The Fantastic Four’ already has a reboot in the pipeline. Now, two other unfortunate duds might be getting a second (or third?) shot at the big screen. Marvel honcho Kevin Feige has revealed that both The Punisher and Daredevil are on Marvel’s “short list” of characters the studio hopes to revive, now that the rights to them have reverted back home.
The Punisher has already appeared in several movies. In 1989, a low budget bomb starring Dolph Lundgren was released, but more recently Thomas Jane starred as the vigilante in a 2004 flop, which somehow managed to get a sequel/relaunch as ‘Punisher: War Zone’ in 2008, with Ray Stevenson assuming the lead role. And of course, Ben Affleck starred in the cinematic version of ‘Daredevil’ in 2003, which also got a spin-off, ‘Elektra’ starring Jennifer Garner.
Marvel has plans for them, but Feige cautions that you shouldn’t be on the lookout too soon.
“We’re trying to figure out what to do with Daredevil now. Punisher could show up at one point. You know, once we get characters back into the Marvel fold we don’t want to do something right away, we want to do the smart thing at the smart time.”
Rumored to be up next are two characters that have never had their shot at a feature film, Doctor Strange and Black Panther. So The Punisher and Daredevil have have to get in line behind them, as well as possibly, an unnamed female lead.
And hopefully with time, the memories of the first attempts will fade from all of our memories. Are you excited about the possibility of seeing these characters back on the big screen?
Source Blastr
