Night Thrasher... the Series!!

[Guest starvenger]

According to today’s Hollywood Reporter, Marvel’s Night Thrasher is readying for a jump from comics to television. The trade reports that the black superhero will bow as a one-hour drama on UPN, co-produced by the Universal-based Reveille and Marvel Studios.

A member of the New Warriors, in the comics, Night Thrasher was a martial artist with no real superpowers to speak of. In his civilian identity, Dwayen Michael Taylor, he was the head of the Taylor Foundation. Similar to Batman, Taylor’s parents were killed when he was a child, and now, as an adult, he uses his fortune and abilities to fight crime.

 

In the UPN series, Taylor will be the 25-year-old multimillionaire owner of a hot hip-hop clothing line, enjoying the high life with a penthouse apartment overlooking New York's Central Park. But he also lends his superhero services to the CIA, having been recruited by his CIA agent uncle, who raised him.

 

Michael (Brown Sugar) Elliot will write the project as well as executeive produce, along with Reveille’s Ben Silverman and Marvel's Avi Arad and Rick Ungar.

 

The move by Marvel and Universal is clearly one to flex Marvel’s character muscle, which has so far been very successful with movies, to television. In a recent press call, Marvel’s President, Bill Jemas acknowledged it was an area that Marvel needed to expand into – as Marvel’s cross-town competition had already found it to be fertile ground with their properties.

 

“To give credit where it’s due, AOL/Time Warner is miles ahead of us with respect to television, both animated and live action, and they’re doing a spectacular job there,” Jemas said.

 

Marvel’s animated Spider-Man series is slated to debut early in 2003 on MTV.

OK, I'm the resident New Warrior mark here, but based on the premise I can't see this lasting very long as a network show, and might be better off doing the syndie route like Mutant X. Since we don't have full details, I'm not gonna rant and rail, but I'd like to see them:

- develop a motivation for Taylor becoming a hero. Hey, he's rich, he's not gonna just jump into a union suit and go.

- use the armour. Hey, it's got a skateboard, so the kids'll love it, right? In this case, leather and spandex really won't work all that well.

- give him some allies. You kinda doubt that he'd be the only hero a government agency uses, and since this is UPN, I fully expect Rage and Rocket Racer (or facimilies thereof) to show up.

 

I'll try and keep up on this, but bear in mind that I may, at times, have the rose-coloured glasses on...

[Guest Vyce]

I'm a huge comic book mark.

 

But really....how many good (non-animated) superhero / comic book TV shows are there? Not many.

 

This will probably wind up being as disappointing as Smallville and Birds of Prey.

[Guest Sassquatch]

I pray that this show does not turn into another "Mantis" TV show.

 

One of FOX's more horrendous shows in the mid '90's.

[Guest gthureson]

Judging by the subtle changes in the description, I expect it to be a trainwreck.

 

There is a certain allure for a main-character that could live a life of ease, but for various reasons carries a deep seeded anger and thirst for justice that drives him to put on a silly costume and fight criminals. Its worked fine for Batman for what, 60 years?

 

However...the premise of being a multimillionaire clothing designer with a CIA uncle who recruited you just seems to be asking for very contrived and convoluted plotlines that will fly as well as the Hindenburg.

 

Motivation is one of the most important parts of a character. And this version seems to have very little, and the character will suffer greatly as a result.

 

But, I could be wrong. Maybe it'll fly.

[Guest Sassquatch]

I'm sorry but the biggest thing that I see hurting this show is a possible lack of intriguing and/or cool villains for Thrash to fight.

 

If you don't think a show needs cool villains to draw ratings then go ahead and look at Batman Beyond.

 

I hope that the show produces some good villains for Thrash to fight. Maybe some Marvel villain cameos.

[Guest gthureson]

Don't think you're going to get it. Sounds like its going to be fighting lots of foreign mooks with Uzi's, judging by the CIA Op status.

 

I have very little faith in TV writers to think outside the box very much, and I am thinking they are going for the movie version of Blade demographic here, except without vampires.

 

I predict lots of kung-fu moves, some gadgets, and hordes of nameless bad guys and vague missions of government security.

[Guest Sassquatch]

Hence my comparison to Mantis.

 

The show could have been something to watch but thanks to a lack of interesting and intimidating/convincing bad guys, the show suffered and it was cancelled after it's first season.

[Guest starvenger]

I pray that this show does not turn into another "Mantis" TV show.

 

One of FOX's more horrendous shows in the mid '90's.

Actually I could see it sinking to the levels of Nightman, if done improperly. I don't think that there's the potential to hit JLA-bad levels, though.

[Guest Sassquatch]

Nightman was too campy looking with the stunts involved. Not to mention the rogue's gallery he had was "lacking" to say the least. Malibu Comics characters was not a good idea to try and make a TV show out of.

[Guest starvenger]

Malibu Comics characters was not a good idea to try and make a TV show out of.

Tell that to the guys who want to make a movie about Prime...

[Guest Sassquatch]

If Prime had an interesting rogue's gallery (General Samus sucked) and if the movie had a good director on board who can work with crap like Prime, I could see it being a moderate success. Waste two hours and then go home.

 

The thing that I'm curious about is whether or not they would try to have Prime be CGI created or find some huge body builder to play him.