MTV recently posted an article in which they quoted Mark Millar, creator of Wanted and Kick-Ass, as saying that DC Entertainment couldn't "afford" to hire him to write a Superman trilogy, something he has been personally campaigning for for some time. Now, Millar is setting the record straight, blogging:
"I don't think I said they couldn't afford me now. If I did I was joking because writing Superman would be a massive payday so if I said that I was obviously laughing at the time. It's possible though as I like being glib.
Nobody has ever seen my Superman idea besides Matthew [Vaughan, director of Kick-Ass]. We never pitched. I've never done a pitch in my life (it's demeaning) so all this stuff about people hating my Superman ideas, etc, is just bullshit. Nobody's seen it. I don't write or give ideas away for free and simply wouldn't. I mentioned a big epic idea to Empire in a Wanted interview which was a couple of lines long, but no story stuff at all. So the stuff about me pitching is nonsense. I don't and will never pitch. That's why I like working in comics.
In the
Empire article that Millar is referring to, he said:
"It’s gonna be like Michael Corleone in the Godfather films, the entire story from beginning to end, you see where he starts, how he becomes who he becomes, and where that takes him. The Dark Knight showed you can take a comic book property and make a serious film, and I think the studios are ready to listen to bigger ideas now.
"The problem with Superman Returns was like releasing Star Wars in ’77, The Empire Strikes Back in ’80 and then waiting 28 years to release Return of the Jedi, it wasn’t relevant. I understand what Bryan Singer was trying to do, to pay homage to Richard Donner’s original vision, but I think you should pay homage by doing something completely different.”
"I want to start on Krypton, a thousand years ago, and end with Superman alone on Planet Earth, the last being left on the planet, as the yellow sun turns red and starts to supernova, and he loses his powers."
Of course, the point might be moot, considering the recent announcement from Diane Nelson that DC Entertainment has
no "current plans" to produce a Superman movie.