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10 Lesser-Known Comic Book Characters That Deserve a TV Show
by Scott Stoute
(11 of 10)
10 Lesser Known Comic Book Characters That Deserve TV Shows
With the 2012 San Diego Comic Con at an end, we are left with some pretty exciting announcements about some lesser-known comic book characters like DC Comics' Lobo and Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy getting the feature-film treatment.
With the exception of Arrow, most superheroes are headed to the big screen - so we decided to take a closer look at some of our favorite (but perhaps not so well known) comic book characters that would make truly awesome TV shows.
Let's kick things off with the man with a face most don’t soon forget…
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I would LOVE to see a Batwoman show.
Yeah a batwoman show would be intersting
A Jonah Hex show could be interesting. The character needs some redemption after that movie… yikes.
I agree. Deadwood, Hell on Wheels, even Justified has shown that westerns do work these days.
I wouldn’t mind seeing a Fables series on HBO. Kind of got that now(albeit waterdowned) with Once Upon A Time on ABC. A Venom animated series with Flash Venom and a Bishop series would be awesome also. Bishop was one of my favorite characters from the 90′s X-Men cartoon. Love the idea but it would be Marvel television with Venom and Bishop. We all know how Marvel is with their tv properties. If they had a good thing going they would just wind up canceling it like they are with Avengers:EMH and like they did with Spectacular Spiderman. That or they would find a way to screw up Venom and Bishop up on the small screen to where it would be painful to watch like some other series. Looking at you Ultimate Spiderman.
I would love a show about Madrox. X-factor is one of my favorite Marvel titles.
Actually, I think the character who deserves a series more than anyone is Peter Parker/Spider-Man. The films are very good, but they are just too limiting for a character as rich as Peter Parker. 120 minutes every 3 years or so is just not enough Spidey for me.
YES! Finally someone who agrees with me!!!
Fascinating read Scott, well-written and handsomely presented.
I was not familiar with most of the characters with my comic book
history essentially limited to Superman, Captain America, and Batman.
You make a convincing case. Now if only television producers shared
your imagination and were not as risk averse as they tend to be.
Hey thanks Robert!! I too wish some TV producers would take a risk on some of these, specially Multiple Man, Bishop and Red Sonja, if done right they can make a lot of money –but if you ever feel like expanding your comic book knowledge past Batman, I suggest Fables, Alias and X-Statix, you won’t be disappointed!
The strength of several of these titles would rely on what network picked them up–as you pointed out with Red Sonja. Several are cable-worthy, even if it were SyFy or AMC. Might be easier to justify bigger budgets for smaller-runs (6 or 13 episodes) too.
Excellent point, Jason, on where these shows could land.
It seems that most risk is taken on the cable channels and
they are finding an audience while still managing the budgets.
The cable networks seem to be attracting more Hollywood “names” to their projects, either before or behind the camera. Something dynamic and unique would certainly attract the right kind of talent and help tell a story we haven’t all seen a thousand times. As many variations of stories that exist in the world of comics, one would think it would be easy pickings.
You’re welcome, Chris, and thanks for the suggestions.
I’ll check them out along with a few other titles you
covered in your article that look quite intriguing.
Isn’t Robert Rodriguez still planning a Red Sonja movie….keyword there is planning though :/
Moon Knight and Heroes for Hire! Come now.
I thought there was talk of a Moon Knight franchise a few years ago.
Etrigan the Demon I think could make a cool show.
Actually Etrigan was on my original list – but under closer inspection I realized it probably wouldn’t work out so well. I question the ability to do a realistic live-action transformation with him and all that rhyming would get old REALLY fast. Maybe an animated series might me cool though
Id rather see she hulk on film with ruffalo and angie Harmon staring as her.
And also I’d rather see red Sonja on the big screen with Megan fox.
But great list a bat woman show would be sick!
Only one I would be down for is Multiple Man. More like suspense/drama, with some humor thrown in…that would be constant opportunities for suspense in there!
Most of these have zero chance of happening due to the high budget special effects required to make it work. The only one that would be interesting with a realistic budget cap is Bishop.
I could defenitely get into an X-men t.v. show./ I also think A x-men district-x show would be amazing. so many different shows you could do with the x-men and they could be really really good if enough money and creative directing and acting was invovled.
Venom!!!
I love the idea of a (good) jonah hex show, and batwoman and flash venom too. too bad itll never be
A TV show or a TV series ?
Suggestion that wasn’t in the article or added in the comments, yet. Taskmaster. He’s a pretty sweet character but very odd character. ***Spoilers if you haven’t kept up on the comics****he’s married, a former S.h.i.e.l.d agent and everything is does is planned out by his wife without him knowing due to memory problems.***** I don’t know about all that such, but he would be very interesting to see on tv or in the movies.
Moon knight if the show is based around his time spent in LA. I also think Eric O’Grady aka Ant-Man would be a pretty funny series as well. It would just all depend on what they do with the movie. Heroes for hire could work really well as a television series as well.
Why not heroes for hire?
Iron Fist and Powerman? HELL YES!!!
If done correctly, those two might get a movie!
I would think Moon Knight and Daredevil (from Marvel), and Flash (from DC) would be good on this list as well.
Okay. Interesting list. Bishop, good choice, you can play around with the “laws” of time travel [Just don't let SciFi -I refuse to use that other name- (Never Forget!) anywhere near that.]
Alright, I’ll pull the pin on this…
Where’s Deadpool… c’mon, action, comedy… and romance. Who do I need to suggest Zucker, Abrams and Zucker do it? (Airplane! 3, with Deadpool)
[Note to self, don't write comments after reading Deadpool]
(Let me just cross that out)
Lol well I’m a huge Deadpool fan too, but he’s kind of a character that is cute for a taste, but not a swallow. He’s a really hard dude to humanizes as he’s always joking and no actor is going to be willing to wear that suit all the time on screen (as under the mask Deadpool is horribly scarred) – but ultimately I left him out because he’ll probably get his own movie anyway.
no CABLE aka Nathan Summers show? that would ROCK! and you could get away with doing it on a modest budget…
Hey if they could do it, I’d eat from that plate, but Cable’s greatest enemy is Apocalypse (pretty much what Cable was created for) Good luck doing that on a modest budget.
You could do apocalype on a ” modest” budget. just use practicle FX. you would really only need CGI if he decided to grow huge in size. it would be EPIC!!!
i was just talking about how they need to make something with venom as the lead, they could do so much with a show about him
he could rip s*** right up son!!
Great list. If they can’t afford to make the show live action, you’re right they should do a dark cartoon. One with the sex and violence, I guess Adult Swim or even FX would be a good place to air it. A great example was SPAWN, that was enjoyable for the short time it was on the silver screen.
I think DC has a choke hold on Adult Swim or anything being broadcasted on Cartoon network. Not for sure, though.
Amazing list!! Never heard of Fray before, but after reading this I looked it up and now I would kill for a Fray tv show!
Bishop would be cool too, but didn’t he turn evil in the comics now?
Hey thanks, definitely get into Fray, if you’re a Buffy fan it will fill a bit of a hole lol.
As for poor old Bishop, yeah they “kinda” turn him into a villain. Long story short, a mutant “messiah” was born (Google: Hope Summers) while many believed she was the one to save the mutant race, Bishop believes she was the cause of the horrible dystopic future he comes from. He believes by killing the kid he will save the future (and his family that suffer there). Of course this caused conflict with the X-Men, (specially Cable) and now he’s seen as a monster.
Despite his actions he truly believes he’s doing the right thing – so depending on your view of the situation he’s either still a good guy or a bad guy. Personally I pick the latter.
What?! That’s crazy! Way to ruin a good superhero Marvel.
Moon knight !
Exapanding on Entrigan I think morpheus aka Sandmanlord of dreams would work as a platform for a buddy cop adventure on AMC think Supernatural with lucifer as a fellow prisoner within the sphere of entrapment (see Preludes and Nocturnes.) then have Entrigan as a infornment on he sate of hell along with cain and abel for morpheus. We start with with Lucifer Wanting vengence but yet redeming himself through his hunt for magic users (Cue john consintine appearence and spin off here) with him ready to be solo by the wake (assume two seasons half sandman half lucifer with overlap per volume script pending) or maybe Daniel as a kid sidekick. Thus you get the basis for justice league dark with Sandman as your Furyesque character and lucifer and constine drawing in dead man ,mistress Xanadu and others in there subsequent showsor recuuring appearences.
I Apoligise deeply for my speeling its late here in aus
I think Chew would make a great TV show (there have been rumors in the past, but it seems to be in development hell right now).
Detective shows are so run-of-the-mill and boring to me, yet so many are on TV. It would be nice to have one with an interesting twist. I think the concept might be off-putting for any of the big networks, but it would be right at home on HBO, Showtime (who was rumored to pick it up), or AMC.
Why not Vampirella?
The Vigilante from classic DC would be great as a TV show too. He was the only DC character I really warmed to besides Batman.
Man, sorry to be a wet blanket. But most superheroes belong on the big screen. TV just doesn’t offer the budget needed. Also, I may be in the minority but I though Smallville sucked, and Arrow looks like a watered-down pseudo-superhero show.
Lol don’t apologies for having an opinion as long as you have a good reason in thinking so. Frankly I mostly agree with you, that’s why I picked these guys. A lot of them don’t have things that would be too hard to depict on TV. Nowadays a lot of TV shows (IE Spartacus, Game of Thrones) do have big production budgets but limited episodes so for shows like Red Sonja it wouldn’t be so hard.
As a big Superman fan Smallville was kinda my ugly baby. I mean I loved it cuz it was my Superman- related, but I spent most of the episodes yelling at the TV like an angry football coach. Arrow looks ok so far, I’m not a huge Green Arrow fan to begin with so I’m not too pressed about what they do with him.
Never thought Multi man would make a good show (if it was JUST him). But this convinced me, it would be totally unique, same with Bishop… Jonah Hex would be kinda like Deadwood, but darker, and it needs a reboot after the movie.
Not a fan of Gus. To be totally honest…