Fox Wants to Make 'League of Extraordinary Gentleman' Into a Victorian 'Avengers'
Update of the legendary bomb could be Fox's attempt at launching yet another cinematic universe
League of Extraordinary Gentleman was such a massive flop that it wouldn’t be remembered at all if it weren’t for the fact that it convinced Sean Connery, a man who survived Zardoz, to walk away from the film industry forever. Now, Variety reports that Ira Napoliello (producer of the accurately rated Mr. Popper’s Penguins) and Matt Reilly (producer of the underrated Prince Avalanche) have been handed the movie rights to Alan Moore’s steampunk masterpiece.
Allan Quartermain is back.
The comic’s gimmick is to take established characters like Tom Sawyer, Captain Nemo, Allan Quartermain, Mina Harker, and Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde, and the Invisible Man and toss them together into an Avengers-style super team. The team’s famous roster makes them perfect for an expanded cinematic universe, something seemingly every studio is interested in since Marvel started dominating the box office. This isn’t the first time someone’s tried to revive the property. Fox announced a series back in 2013 but the production never made it beyond the pilot.
It's worth noting that Alan Moore absolutely hates Hollywood and has never made an effort to tell movie-friendly stories - even if he did sell the rights to his work for millions. Though he's made no statement on the remake announcement, Moore did publicly chortle at the TV news in 2013, mocking the exec's apparent need to rummage through "dust bins and spittoons in the dead of night to recycle things." That comment was only part of a really charming transatlantic conversation in which producer Don Murphy dismissed Moore as "an old man who smokes too much hash and prays to a lizard god."
