Quentin Tarantino likes to talk about projects he is considering, even though many of them never come to fruition, so it comes as somewhat of a surprise to hear about a potential film he was interested in making that had never been discussed before. Even more surprising is that film would have been a comic book adaptation.
In an interview with MTV while out flogging his new film Django Unchained, Tarantino reveals that he had been thinking about doing a film based on a popular Marvel Comics character and had even approached Lawrence Fishburne about starring in it.
After Reservoir Dogs, I had considered doing a Luke Cage, Hero For Hire movie. Ed Pressman owned the rights at that time, and we talked about it. I talked to Larry Fish about being Luke Cage, and he really liked that idea. Then I ended up writing Pulp Fiction.
Well, I guess what was Fishburne and comic book movie fans’ loss turned out to be John Travolta and indie film fans’ gain.
The idea of Tarantino directing a Luke Cage movie certainly sends the imagination reeling. The comic, created by writer Archie Goodwin and artist John Romita in 1972, was an attempt to create a superhero character in the mold of heroes in the then-popular Blaxploitation film craze and, as is very obvious, Tarantino is very much a fan of that genre. If there was ever a comics character suited for Tarantino’s film sensibilities it is Luke Cage.
More recently director John Singleton was developing a Luke Cage movie with Marvel Studios with a by screenwriter Ben Ramsey in 2004, but as there has been no news on the project in several years it has presumably died in development hell.
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