Spawn Creator Todd McFarlane Teases A New 90-Minute Animated Project

Todd McFarlane's Spawn is a true phenomenon at this point, having become the longest-running creator-owned comic of all time. While Spawn's quarter-century run in the comics is a feat in itself, it's the series' continued potential for larger franchise expansion is equally impressive. McFarlane has (at times single-handedly) kept the fires burning for new Spawn movie and TV series opportunities, and in our recent discussions with the comic and toy pioneer, he definitely had more fuel to add to that particular fire. According to Todd McFarlene's not-so-subtle teases while on our Talking Shop show, a new Spawn animated project may be on the way!

"Actually years ago we started a second go-round at it, and I still have all of that work. And it includes all the voice recordings and everything. So I've got about ninety minutes of a show ready, teed up, ready to go; the only thing I need to do is the cell animation, everything else has been designed. Obviously we need to put some music and sound effects or something - but yeah, I've been sitting on a 90-minute version of it for a long time. I've just been waiting to launch the movie to say 'Hey, let's tumble this all out at the appropriate time.' But yeah, we'll get animation done."

If you've been keeping careful score of things, McFarlane has basically been playing a shrewd (risky) game of creator-controlled movie-making that could indeed net him some big reward$ - if it ever gets done. His Spawn reboot movie is something he has been unbending about, from the mid-budget horror approach (think Se7en with a supernatural twist), to he being the writer and director of the feature. Jeremy Renner and Jamie Foxx are attached, and Blumhouse Pictures was backing it, but McFarlane told us last summer that the agreeing on the financials with the studio was still an ongoing problem:

"The money's sitting on the sidelines ready to go. I just need to get everyone that wants to put in money to shake their heads to the same script. As you can imagine, everyone has a slightly different version of it in their head. You just go and trying to appease a handful of people while not giving in to what it is that I'm trying to do myself. Because if I have to change it too much, I'll just walk away from it all."

Since then, work on the Spawn reboot has seemingly continued, as McFarlane recently teased nearly landing another big actor for the film. We'll keep you updated how it goes with the Spawn reboot and animated project.