Bat in the Sun, the online production hub best known for their superhero battle royale series Super Power Beat Down, will reportedly launch a webseries centered on Valiant Comics character Ninjak.
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Bleeding Cool talked to sources who confirmed what many had assumed after a series of tweets over the weekend: that Michael Rowe, Jason David Frank, and pro wrestler John Morrison are all involved on some level with a web-based video project that will see Rowe star as Colin King, the hero known as Ninjak.
Rowe, who played Suicide Squad member Deadshot on Arrow before his character died to make way for a big-screen version played by Will Smith, got the discussion moving when he tweeted something that teased his involvement with Valiant Entertainment. Along with his eyes and the company logo, Rowe hashtagged the image “#ninja.”
Of course, Valiant’s resident ninja, a character named Ninjak, is a white guy whose eyes are the only thing visible through his mask. So it’s pretty easy to see where people would pretty quickly get the idea that’s who he’s playing.
In the tweet, which you can see below, Rowe also tagged Bat in the Sun, who besides Super Power Beat Down have also worked with Machinima on projects like Transformers: Combiner Wars and Street Fighter: Resurrection.
Secret project. Announcement coming soon… #Ninja@ValiantComics @BatintheSun pic.twitter.com/7wa4dCYML0
— Michael Rowe (@Captain_Rowe) August 26, 2016
What’s apparently in the offing is slightly more sophisticated than just Valiant finally getting representation in the fan-favorite fight series Super Power Beat Down, with Rowe’s Ninjak fighting off various heroes of the Valiant Universe.
The project will apparently be officially announced at New York Comic Con.
Bleeding Cool names almost every major Valiant character as candidates to fight Ninjak, although after both Valiant and Bat in the Sun declined to comment for this story, I heard from a reliable source with knowledge of the production that Bleeding Cool’s list is not entirely accurate. Since their list covered a whole lot of ground, it seems more likely that characters could be included on it and not in the show than the other way around — but I couldn’t get much in the way of details — and nothing worth publishing at this early stage.
In the comments below Rowe’s tweet, Valiant CEO Dinesh Shamdasani wrote that he was excited about the project, and added the hashtag for New York Comic Con. Over on his own Twitter feed, he also retweeted a pair of reports that claimed he had tied the project to Frank and Morrison. Morrison recently appeared as The Winter Soldier in Bat in the Sun’s Nightwing vs. The Winter Soldier video.
So far, there hasn’t been much movement on live-action projects from Valiant. They have had both Bloodshot and Harbinger in development for a while, and made some waves a couple of years ago when a Chinese firm invested huge money into their R&D, but if there’s an announcement coming with actors already attached and, as Shamdasani seems to suggest, footage already shot, it’s likely the first real live-action project we’ll see from the company since they relaunched in 2012.