We get an update on the Spawn movie from creator, director and writer Todd McFarlane at this week’s New York Comic-Con who actually reveals the film doesn’t have the official green light as of yet.
Todd McFarlane reveals in a Q&A that the Hollywood execs are hesitant to push the button because Spawn is going to be R-rated and not PG-13.
The news is unfortunate because it sounds like Spawn might be something truly unique, and it sounds like it is ready to go, but just needs final approval from the studios.
Todd McFarlane is the writer and director on Spawn with Jason Blum and Blumhouse producing and stars Jamie Foxx as Al Simmons and the titular character, and The Avengers Hawkeye-actor Jeremy Renner as Twitch Williams.
Todd also previously compared his Spawn to something like a Jaws and also said it’s not like an R-rated superhero movie like Logan and Deadpool, which were actually more like hard PG-13 flicks.
Fandom transcribed what Todd McFarlane had to say about Spawn at the NYCC, which includes a possible title:
Todd McFarlane:
“What’s next is getting Hollywood to get this. They’re still a little timid of doing a true, dark, nasty R-rated superhero… as soon as you say superhero, they sort of go into a little bit of a default. So we’re still trying to get them across the finish line.”
“The weak link in this whole thing is me. We’ve got Spawn, we’ve got Jamie [Foxx], Jeremy [Renner] and Jason [Blum]. I’m going to surround myself with an Academy Award-winning director of photography so it will look good. The acting will be good. Stop thinking of this as a traditional superhero movie! Because they go ‘How-come Spawn’s not in it more?’ And all the comments are based on superhero PG-13 thinking. We showed it to a couple of people at the studio last week and you could see they were a little bit… The mistake we made I think…. I told my agent ‘You didn’t let me go in the room!’ I need to go into the room. I need to sell it. I need to tell them what the frame is, of this picture, of the script that they are about to read, because they still keep going into the superhero default. And it doesn’t make sense.”
“If you read my script with the superhero mode, it’s confusing. You go ‘I don’t understand it.’ Think about it as a scary movie that will get people to be mesmerised by Jeremy Renner’s acting and his character. And then ‘Oh yeah right, Spawn’s in this movie!’ And then he comes and when Spawn comes he’s not owned by corporate America. I don’t care about selling t-shirts and hats. So when Spawn comes, you better not wanna be the bad guy, because when Spawn comes, it’s nice and calm, and then you’re gone. He will mess you up and he will do it in a harsh way. He doesn’t care if he’s selling any toys or t-shirts.”
“…We need to keep nudging them just a little bit more. I think this audience is old enough. I think you are hungry for the same thing I’m hungry for, which is nasty!”
On the Spawn title:
“If I had to give a title to the first movie, it would be Spawn… Do You Believe?. Because everyone in this movie is going to be going ‘I don’t even know if this even exists, or if it’s in my head, or if it’s a boogeyman, or if it’s physical.’ Once you get past that — we’ll be there probably at the half-way point in the movie — but once you get past that, the second movie becomes completely different. Because now people will be talking to each other different. Because the first movie was ‘I’m crazy, I don’t even know if you exist.’ But the second movie I know you exist so I can have a different conversation.”
