Big Trouble In Little China: Old Man Jack Coming From John Carpenter and BOOM!

Filmmaker John Carpenter is returning to one of his best-loved properties this fall as he team [...]

By Russ Burlingame

Filmmaker John Carpenter is returning to one of his best-loved properties this fall as he team with BOOM! Studios to create a new Big Trouble in Little China comic book.

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(Photo: BOOM! Studios)

The series, which Carpenter will co-write with Anthony Burch, will take place in the year 2020 and feature an aging Jack Burton on a last stand against a seemingly-unbeatable supernatural threat.

"Big Trouble in Little China was one of my absolute favorite movies when I was a kid," Burch told EW in a statement. "To call it formative to my development would be one hell of an understatement. Its high-fantasy world and lovably lowbrow hero… hasn't lessened its grip on me in the twenty or so years since I first saw it."

Big Trouble In Little China: Old Man Jack will feature art by Jorge Corona and will begin publishing in September. The series is not the first Big Trouble in Little China comic put together at BOOM!, the publisher with whom Carpenter also works closely on Escape From New York comics. The previous volume lasted 25 issues and eventually brought a time-tossed-and-still-young Burton to 2015 (the then-present).

A Big Trouble in Little China/Escape From New York crossover miniseries also happened, because this is a great time to be alive.

Here's how EW describes the Old Man Jack idea:

"Old Man Jack is set in the year 2020, and hell is literally on Earth, with the demon god Ching Dai declaring himself ruler of all. Jack Burton is alone in Florida with only his broken radio for company, until one day it picks up a message. Someone is out there in the hellscape, and they know a way to stop Ching Dai."

While Big Trouble in Little China is reportedly being rebooted with Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson in the role of Burton, the decision to age Jack in real time makes him look even more like Kurt Russell, the actor who played Burton in the original. In the vein of Evil Dead, one can imagine the appeal of bringing Russell back to the role if he were willing for one or two more efforts, all while launching the reboot as its own thing.

That's likely a pipe dream, but worth asking, particularly given the recent resurgence in conversation around Big Trouble in Little China. The film was reportedly a big influence on the way James Gunn wrote Star-Lord in the Guardians of the Galaxy movies, so bringing Kurt Russell on to play Star-Lord's literal father in Volume 2 feels like an intentional homage.

The Emerald City Video Podcast recently did an episode reviewing and discussing both films in that context, which you can check out below.

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