Jim Starlin’s DREADSTAR Latest Comic Hero Set For The Big Screen

As more and more big name comic book properties get snatched up by major studios, producers have to cast their nets wider to find comic properties to adapt. This is not always a bad thing.

The Hollywood Reporter states that Benderspink and Illuminati Entertainment have teamed up to bring Jim Starlin’s creator-owned property, Dreadstar, to the big screen. You might know Starlin’s name as the creator of Thanos, the baddie revealed in the credits scene of The Avengers. He is also the creator of several characters in Marvel’s August offering, Guardians of the Galaxy.

Dreadstar is a futuristic sci-fi epic that tells the story of Vanth Dreadstar, the lone survivor of the Milky Way Galaxy who finds himself caught in an interstellar conflict between two warring factions. The strip first appeared in Epic Illustrated in 1982, and ran in various forms in various titles for various publishers until 1991.

While no studio has been attached or script written as of yet, I consider this a good sign. There were a lot of great characters and concepts to come out of independent and/or creator-owned comics in the 1980s, many of which would make excellent films. I’d love to see films based on Mage, American Flagg, Nexus, or Badger, just to name a few.