You might recall that just last month we reported on Disney’s first big TV plans for its recently-acquired Marvel catalogue of characters, with word that The Incredible Hulk would be rampaging across the small screen. Now there are some fresh details about the creative team spearheading the project – Guillermo del Toro and former Battlestar Galactica producer David Eick are in charge.
And yes, we do mean the Guillermo del Toro, the man busying himself with readying At The Mountains of Madness for its shoot, producing approximately 10,000 other movies, lending his creative oversight to DreamWorks Animation’s ‘toons and Disney horrors-for-kids, and writing books. We wouldn’t be at all surprised to see him announce an album of pop hits early next year.
For the Hulk, Eick will have the lion’s share of the duties, writing the script for the pilot and likely either running the show himself or finding someone to steer its day-to-day operation. Del Toro will work on the story and aim to carve out some time in his schedule to direct that kick-off episode. Plus he’s also working with the team that will design the Hulk creature to work on the show which, unlike the movies, will need to employ a more cost-effective blend of CG, puppetry and prosthetics. But probably not a bodybuilder painted green.
As for the plot, Deadline dug up what few details exist at this point, including the fact that it'll aim to be another origin tale, and that Bruce Banner will be slightly younger than we’ve seen him recently, a twentysomething physicist with his life a little more in order who nevertheless still has his angry moments.
"I have always been attracted at the combination of comic book heroics and monsters, Jack Kirby's Demon or Kamandi or DC's Deadman or Marvel's Dr. Strange, Morbius, Metamorpho, Mike Mignola's Hellboy,” Del Toro tells Deadline. Adding that after meeting Eick, "We coalesced a respectful but powerful way of retelling the Banner/Hulk story in a fresh way." It’s not his first attempt at bringing the troubled creature to life – he tried to get the rights to make a Hulk film around the time of Blade II.
As for when – and, given the notoriously fickle and budget-minded world of US network TV, plus the fact that the pair are still in negotiations, if – we’ll see the show, we’ll have to wait until at least 2012. Not only does the complexity of the concept mean it’ll need a long lead-time, but Marvel and ABC are apparently looking to launch it after The Avengers has helped bring the character back into everyone’s minds in May 2012…