'The Human Fly' Headed To The Big Screen

While Marvel continues to dominate the comic book movie world both in terms of bringing the characters to life and reaping some serious financial rewards ("The Avengers" crossed $600 million domestic this week), it pays to remember that there are many characters the studio doesn't have the rights to (for example, many of the X-Men, Wolverine, etc.). And it appears The Human Fly is one of them as a movie is now on the way about that character.

Deadline reports that Alan Brewer and Steven Goldman recently snapped up the rights to the character and "The Human Fly" is on the way. There are minor characters, and then there are minor characters and The Human Fly is definitely that. Curiously, there are two separate characters in the Marvel universe who go by that name -- a hero and a villain -- and it's the former that will get the big screen treatment. Only existing in a brief 19-issue run during the '70s, the character is kind of dull -- a man who gets into a severe car accident, has much of his skeleton rebuilt with steel (shades of Wolverine) and winds up....putting on a mask and performing as a stunt daredevil doing charity events for kids with disabilities. Zzzz. Inevitably he crosses paths with bad guys and rest writes itself. He briefly got mixed up with Spider-Man who confused him with the bad guy of the same name and that's about as exciting as it got.

We suppose there's some allure in a hero who is "real" (well, to the extent he just has a super strong skeleton) but overall, not exactly the most enticing character in the world. But the movie pushes forward with a script by Cirque Du Soleil in-house historian (!?) Tony Babinski with Goldman set to direct. We can't find any other movie credits for these guys, and this one is going to be financed independently, so don't expect some kind of mega blockbuster unless some financiers really roll the dice on this. We'll see how far it goes, but any choices to take the lead role?