Man-Thing: How Kevin Feige Was Instrumental in Development of SYFY Original

Around these parts, Kevin Feige is a name synonymous with the highest-grossing franchise to ever grace Hollywood. Overseeing the development of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Feige has become the highest-earning producer of all time thanks to massive box office hauls like Avengers: Endgame and Black Panther. As with most career projections across any industry, however, everything wasn’t always a massive win.

Long before the days of Disney’s MCU, Marvel Studios was still an entity partnering with various studios to make films based on the vast library of Marvel characters. It’s how fans got to see X-Men and Fantastic Four movies from 20th Century Fox and a Blade trilogy from New Line Cinema. It’s also how SYFY managed to produce a straight-to-television film based on Marvel’s macabre Man-Thing—and you can best believe Feige had his hand in helping develop the R-rated slasher.

As Man-Thing helmer Brett Leonard tells us, Feige was one of the biggest champions of the filmmaking process, despite only being given around $5 million to make a Marvel movie.

“He was actually one of the greatest supporting energies because when I sent the dailies, he really loved the dailies,” Leonard tells ComicBook.com during our exclusive director’s commentary of the 2005 film. “He loved how I was moving the camera. He was very, very helpful. He was a great guy. And he was just a sweet man, and is to this day. His success is well deserved. He was a great executive to work with.”

Feige would then give Leonard notes on the film, which the filmmaker looks upon fondly to this day.

“I have great emails from him, complimenting me on the camera movement,” the filmmaker adds. “So I always think, well, there you go. I got somebody in Marvel that loved this film. Because this is, again, it’s an outlier in the Marvel universe. The way it was made, the budget it was made at, how it was made, what the scripting process was and how that changed. All of those things were unique in this film.”

Man-Thing is now streaming on Tubi.

Where would you like to see the Marvel icon pop up next? Let us know your thoughts either in the comments section or by hitting our writer @AdamBarnhardt up on Twitter to chat all things Marvel!

Cover photo by Albert L. Ortega/Getty Images