Sony has secured the rights to the 1930s comic strip Flash Gordon with plans to adapt it into a live-action movie.
Sahara director Breck Eisner is set to helm and executive produce the planned adaptation, with Neal Moritz producing.
Sony’s big-screen version of Alex Raymond’s comic strip, first published in 1934, will be the latest incarnation of the Flash character, who had previously been brought to life on screen several times, most notable by Buster Crabbe in the 1930s film serials and again in 1980 by Sam J. Jones. More recently, Flash Gordon was played by Smallville’s Eric Johnson in the now-cancelled Sci Fi Channel television series.
In the original comic strip, Flash was a Yale graduate and Polo player who, along with Dale Arden, is kidnapped by the mad scientist Dr. Hans Zarkov and taken to the planet Mongo where the evil ruler Ming the Merciless plots to destroy the Earth.
[Source: Variety]
Just what we need.
Another remake.
I can’t get that Queen song out of my head now.
Too bad Queen isn’t around to make the sound track.
I knew Flash Gordon best from a series of novels published in the early 70’s including War of the Cybernauts and The Plague of Sound. I keep holding out hope for the character, but that godawful Sci-Fi Channel show makes me wonder if he has a future.
Funny enough, I just watched the 80’s movie for the first time last week. I lost a lot of geek points for that.
I wrote about the experience here:
http://www.thenerdybird.com/2008/05/i-knew-you -were-up-to-something-though.html