Many years ago, for a brief moment, Vincenzo Natali signed on to direct a big screen adaptation of DC Comics‘ "Swamp Thing." He came and went from the project in the span of a month, leaving the potential reboot of the character first brought to the big screen in Wes Craven‘s 1982 movie in the dust. And there hasn’t been much movement since, but now you can get a peek at what he was putting together.
The director has posted the first four pages from the script of what would’ve been his "Swamp Thing." I’ll leave it to fans who know the character better to tell me if he was on the right track, but you can read them by following the tweet below.
Meanwhile, in other movies Natali is not going to make, an adaptation of William Gibson‘s "Neuromancer" is one of them. The project has been kicking around for years with Natali, who has a completed script with input from the famed and beloved sci-fi author, but the project is getting a reboot. Screen Daily reports that the developing movie has gained a new production partner in China’s C2M Media Group, but they have opted to look for new writers and a director to tackle the book.
But don’t worry, Natali does have a new feature project brewing. The trade also reports he’ll helm an adaptation of Stephen King and Joe Hill‘s novella, "In The Tall Grass." The story kicks off when a man and his pregnant sister answer a boy’s cries for help in a field. “When they go to assist the boy, they discover that strange forces are at work,” the director said about the movie, which he wrote the script for. “Space is warped so that one minute they are together and the next they are miles apart. The field is an ineffable maze from which there is no escape. Before long they have lost their bearings and each other. But they are not alone…”
READ MORE: The Essentials: 5 Great Films Based On Stephen King’s Novels
Production on ‘Grass’ begins in September. Until more news arrives about that, read "Swamp Thing" below.
The first four pages of my aborted #SwampThing script. pic.twitter.com/umWSpUJRZs
— Vincenzo Natali (@Vincenzo_Natali) June 1, 2015
Eh, it\’s like Warren Ellis mentions in replies to him (and he confirms in further response) – it\’s a lot like the time Alan Moore wrote the character (with the inclusion of the Sunderland corporation). Where Swamp Thing wasn\’t Alec Holland transformed but the sentient plant life that had absorbed the consciousness of Holland instead. While, yet again, it probably would\’ve pissed off Alan Moore (because what DOESN\’T these days, right?), it could\’ve been interesting to see as a finished product (certainly better than Return of Swamp Thing, which was too focused on Adam West Batman-styled camp nonsense to be worth caring about and far removed from Craven\’s flawed-yet-watchable original film in overall tone).