In order to pull off a successful page-to-screen comic book adaptation, not only do you need a well thought-out story with some serious character development, but a respected, highly-informed. self-proclaimed graphic novel geek must be calling the shots behind the camera.
Take Kevin Smith for example: He recently directed a season 2 episode of CW’s The Flash and will return again come August, he penned a reboot of Superman, and he’s a regular voice of reason when it comes to anything Marvel/DC-related in the news.
While out promoting his latest film Yoga Hosers at the Edinburgh Film Festival, Smith spoke candidly about his desire to direct for small screen superheroes – more specifically, in the streaming realm of Netflix. “You know, they’re gearing up now for The Defenders,” Smith said to IGN about the upcoming Marvel series.
“If I can get a piece of that Defenders mini-series holy shit, could you imagine, dude? Because then you’re working with multiple suits at once. That’d be phenomenal. Just doing a mini-Avengers, even one episode of that run of Defenders is like, ‘Oh, I get to exercise any interest I had in Avengers, but doing it on a scale where nobody’s betting $200 million on the guy that made fuckin’ Yoga Hosers.”
But don’t expect his interests to stray far beyond the concept of long form episode arcs. Despite his work with full-length feature films, the 45-year old Clerks auteur has a penchant for straight forward dialogue, a clear story, and a serious lack of expensive, digital effects.
“I don’t know if a feature would be [for me],” Smith said. “In episodic, somebody did all the heavy lifting for you, told this backstory, and added to the characters and stuff, so you’ve got this rich tapestry to play with for an hour where you don’t have to tell everybody an origin story or tell everyone how this person feels about being this character.”
“In movies, spectacle’s what drives that engine, because that’s what they’re going to put in the trailer. That’s what’s going to make you leave your house to go see it. ‘Holy shit! Did you see that shot of a giant wave?’ I’m not that guy. I’m the guy where they’ve got to sell it on, ‘Oh, did you see that scene where they were talking to each other?’ That’s generally not what people are looking for in a comic book movie.”
Could Silent Bob be our solution to all of the underwhelming, under-developed comic book creations we’ve been seeing as of late?
God, let’s hope so.