Wanted: From Comic Book to the Big Screen

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Wanted: Written by Mark Millar and illustrated by J.G. Jones, it is a six-issue comic book mini-series published between 2003 and 2004 by Top Cow Comics (a graphic novel version was released awhile later) and is for mature readers. In a nut shell, it’s about a young man who goes from zero to all-star anti-hero in world where the world is run by super villains.Unless you are a comic book enthusiast, you probably would not have heard about it. For those more familiar with comic books, but still have not heard of it, it is similar to DC’s “Elseworlds” or Marvel’s “What if” comic line. The big what if in this world is “What if the bad guys won?”

Mimicking DC characters (i.e. there is a Superman type charcter, a Batman type character, a Lex Luther type, a Joker type, etc, etc), it’s a world where all the super villains banded together to strike on the world’s super heroes. The war took place in 1986 and lasted a few years. After the battle, the super villains erased the world’s memory of any super heroes (or super villains for that matter) ever existing (they are only known in comic books, fitting). The super villains run the world behind the scenes doing whatever they want whenever they want.

Fast forward to modern day, our main character Wesley becomes aware of this hidden world when his father (a super villain that disappeared from Wesley’s life at early age) is assassinated. Wesley discovers that he has inherited his father’s role as the notorious super villain, “The Killer.” Wesley also learns he has his father’s super human ability; deadly accuracy with guns of any kind similar to DC’s Deadshot (i.e. he can shoot the wings off a fly, literally). Wesley is trained to be a cold-blooded killer in which readers grow to loathe him as he progresses; he kills, steals, and even rapes on his journey to super villainy.

Most of this world’s super heroes are deceased while the few that remain have had their memories erased along with the rest of the world. The Superman character is confined to a wheel chair while the Batman and Robin type characters believe they are actors playing their super hero counterparts on a campy TV show.

The comic is very much for mature readers. There is cursing, gore, and brief nudity. You know it’s for mature readers when the Bizarro type character is named “F#ckwit” and the Clayface type character is named “S#ithead.” On another interesting note, the main character of Wesley is drawn to look like rapper “Eminem” while Halle Berry’s and Tommy Lee Jones’ likeness are also found in this comic book.

So, Universal Pictures is making a movie based on this comic book, but instead of super villains running the world, it’s a group of leather wearing assassins (whom have magical powers). I guess the studio’s felt the original plot would be too geeky and/or confusing; I agree to some extent. It will star Angelina Jolie, Morgan Freeman, and new comer British actor James McAvoy as Wesley.

It should be enjoyable because it’s a sci-fi/fantasy Matrix-type action thriller; although it might be crap because, well, we’ve seen this movie before for most part. I believe if this movie get’s an R rating, we could get the same feel as the graphic novel. I believe the story of Wesley’s journey will probably be similar, but I doubt he’ll be as bad (evil) as his comic book counterpart.

The movie opens March 28th, 2008. I’ll keep you posted as more develops (i.e. I am waiting for that first trailer); in the mean time, check out “Wanted” the graphic novel before it is redone to look like its movie counterpart.

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