“The New Kid” was the best of the three, in setup, punchline and just being get-able. A young boy is unhappy that his father is uprooting the family for his career again, lamenting that he’ll be the new kid. The hook comes when the strip pulls back to reveal they’re on a space vessel, and he’ll be the new kid on a planet with three-fourths the gravitational pull of Earth.
Because the only story feature-length animated films can tell these days is that of a stranger in a strange land, and the premise of the Penny Arcade strip hints at that, this kind of pitch was an instant-win in Hollywood.
The Hollywood Reporter writes that Paramount has the rights and has assigned Gary Whitta, the writer on The Book of Eli to do the script. Producers are Mary Parent and Cale Boyter of Disruption Entertainment.
Paramount Plots Next Animated Pic with Alien Comic Adaptation ‘New Kid’ (Exclusive) [The Hollywood Reporter]
Chuloopa
Friday, June 3, 2011 at 11:55 AMWhy wouldn’t they just get the guys from penny arcae to write it?
AT least then we’d know it would be good..
Alinos
Friday, June 3, 2011 at 12:09 PMbecause like most things in life Hollywood doesn’t quite care what gamers think.
Though it should be said that the writer they hired was an editor of a games magazine
But not sure why for a kids movie(because undoubtedly thats what it would be) they are using the guy who wrote book of eli
weresmurf
Friday, June 3, 2011 at 12:24 PMExactly. Instead they’ll get the same writer from Vampires suck or some other crap like that who follow the formula of ‘three jokes per page’ (an actual method for ‘parody’ these days in scripts which maximises jokes for minimal laughs) and we’ll be left with a piece of shit which could’ve been funny if Jerry and Mike wrote it :(
Mr Explody
Friday, June 3, 2011 at 1:39 PMI don’t know. If they wrote it, it would scene after scene of endless dialog, dick jokes, and I’m sure Cthulu would make an appearance.
Braaains
Friday, June 3, 2011 at 4:24 PMSurely there would have to be a Fruit Fucker cameo in there somewhere?
The Cracks
Friday, June 3, 2011 at 11:57 AMHollywood = facepalm.
Dissection
Friday, June 3, 2011 at 11:58 AMThe best of their mini-series was easily Automata. The New Kid is a done-to-death cliche…setting it in space doesn’t change that.
The Insufferable Señor Steengo
Friday, June 3, 2011 at 12:54 PMAutomata was fantastic!
AkIRA_22
Friday, June 3, 2011 at 12:56 PMAbsolutely agree. but that would probably be expensive to make. Robots as human partners hasn’t been in a movie for years. Blade Runner + Silence of the lambs = FUCKING AWESOME!
Trjn
Friday, June 3, 2011 at 12:17 PMI’m willing to bet that someone pitched this idea, the studio started working on it in some capacity (hired a scriptwriter to knock out a quick draft), realised the strip existed and bought the rights to preempt any possible lawsuits.
Something that is probably more common than you’d expect and a reason for why many adaptations have little resemblance to the source material.
Villainsoft
Friday, June 3, 2011 at 12:25 PMComing soon, AI that randomizes concepts, combines them and sells them to gullible and greedy hollywood execs.
=
PROFIT!
706
Friday, June 3, 2011 at 12:42 PMI remember when they did the series of one-offs and they spoke about this and the high hopes they had. They mentioned the possibility of this concept going further than simply a comic medium, looks like they did it. Good on them for getting the concept picked up.
I am a little worried on the direction it will go in, I’m sure they had a lot of plans for it and they would probably have been pretty good. We will see what Hollywood can make.
Ctrlburn
Friday, June 3, 2011 at 12:50 PMThe article mentions how the comic has a good punchline. I wonder whose brilliant idea it was to include the last panel of the comic as the picture for the article. Care to tell us how the movie will end, so that can be ruined too?
Neil Williams
Friday, June 3, 2011 at 1:27 PMI think the statute of limitations may have sailed a long time ago on this one, Ctrlburn.
Aaron
Friday, June 3, 2011 at 12:54 PMLookouts was my favourite, boy scouts in a fantasy forest full of monsters. It was brill. An animated show of that done in Gabe style would be sweet.
706
Friday, June 3, 2011 at 3:35 PMThat was very cool, but if it was to happen I would want it to try and be very adult though. For instance, from memory in one of the series one of the boys dies.
PiMan
Friday, June 3, 2011 at 4:49 PMThis was my favourite of the one-off strips. It will be interesting to see where they take it.