Marvel and DC may get the most attention, but the biggest success story of jumping from comic books to the screen is The Walking Dead. A ratings juggernaut right from the start, Robert Kirkman’s zombie story has dominated pop culture for nearly a decade and changed both what comics Hollywood adapts and how they adapt them. And now, Amazon has him in their stable.
Kirkman’s Skybound Entertainment has signed a two-year deal with Amazon to develop TV shows for the service. Amazon recently has been pushing to feature more horror, SF, and action shows, and Skybound, an imprint of Image Comics, definitely fits that mold. In addition to Kirkman’s books, like The Walking Dead, Outcast, and Invincible, all of which are on screens or on the way, Skybound has comics ranging from the crime thriller Thief of Thieves to Science Dog, a half-man half-dog pulp hero who fights aliens and flies around on a jetpack, which really should have been a TV series yesterday.
The main question, of course, is whether anything can rival their rotting, flesh-hungry flagship. Outcast, for example, has mostly done well with critics, but hasn’t made as deep an impression as The Walking Dead. But, of course, the goal for any streaming service is to keep you from watching other streaming services, and if Amazon is hoping to lure genre fans in, there’s plenty of fascinating ideas in Skybound’s stable. But, seriously, start with Science Dog.
(via Amazon)
