WATCHMEN Writer David Hayter Adapting Image Comics Series THE SWORD

This guy has talent.

An Image Cinematic Universe would be great

But that won't happen due to MacFarlane not doing anything and sitting on that suppose Spawn movie he says he's directing and new animated series.

Why is it so hard to call a comic book a comic book? The Sword was a monthly comic book series, not a graphic novel.

This isn't directed at Josh, but the person who wrote the article on The Wrap and all others. It seems like people who write these articles, as well as people in the film/TV industry are so put off by the concept of a comic book that they will only use the term "graphic novel" because it supposedly sounds more respectable. It's a little annoying and it sometimes makes them sound like they don't really know what they're talking about.

The article says it's a graphic novel divided into 4 volumes, as if it was published as a 4-part graphic novel. No, it's a comic book series that was collected into 4 volumes, which then makes it the same format as a graphic novel.

Anyway, it's not that big a deal, but I get a little tired of constantly seeing that.

@LEVITIKUZ, an Image Cinematic Universe could never happen, and it's not simply because of McFarlane.

Look at DC and Marvel. All the DC properties are owned by WB and all but 3 of the Marvel properties are owned by Disney/Marvel Studios and would be produced by those companies. That makes it easy to created a shared universe.

That's a problem for Image. Image isn't owned by any film studio, which means the film properties would not be under one studio.

And here's the biggest problem. Unlike DC and Marvel, Image is a creator owned publisher. Their properties aren't owned by the company, but individual creators. Invincible, Youngblood, Savage Dragon, Spawn, ect.

That's the impossible hurdle. First you'd have to find a studio willing to take on all those properties and then said studio would have to work out individual deals with each creator in order to secure the characters. That's a tricky thing, trying to be a shared universe with numerous individually licensed characters.

You have to make sure every creator stays onboard and doesn't decide not to renew the license for their character or that universe could fall apart. There's the issue of having to pay multiple creators if you want multiple licensed characters to appear in the same movie. That's a problem WB and Marvel Studios don't have because the6y own the properties.

I think the only Image Cinematic Universe we're likely to see is one that's based around an individual creator's characters. You might see a shared universe featuring Robert Kirkman characters or Rob Liefeld (God help us) or any of the other Image guys. But it doesn't seem likely all those creator owned properties could ever be secured by a single studio and put into a shared universe.

I forgot that the voice of Solid Snake and Big Boss was the writer of Watchmen and X-2...

Solid Snake is a writer?

The Sword is an awesome comic! Glad to hear that someone's trying to do an adaptation but the story gets real heavy at times which is a good thing (the Luna Brothers are good at doing heavy themed stories, "Girls" is a good example). I wonder if they'll keep or change some of the key plot points?