Underrated Comic Book Movie Coming to Peacock in January

Peacock, NBCUniversal’s streaming service, has released their official list of upcoming titles for January 2022, including the Peacock debut of Josie and the Pussycats. The Archie Comics adaptation, which stars Rachael Leigh Cook, Tara Reid, an Rosario Dawson, was a box-office disappointment when it was first released in 2001, but has since gone on to become a cult classic. It finally got a Blu-ray release for the first time in November, celebrating the film’s 20th anniversary in glorious 1080p. Now the movie, which was on HBO Max until recently, will be a Peacock exclusive at least for a while.

Josie and the Pussycats, based on Archie Comics characters created by the legendary Dan DeCarlo, was released in April 2001 from directors Harry Elfont and Deborah Kaplan, whose other projects include the coming-of-age comedy Can’t Hardly Wait and the zany slacker comedies Mary + Jane and Liza on Demand. The movie was a biting satire of consumer culture and the turn-of-the-century music industry, wrapped with glitter and glamour that was supposed to make it more palatable to audiences, but instead seemingly turned off many critics, who associated it with other “dumb” movies of the day like Spice World and Coyote Ugly.

The boy band featured in the movie — DuJour, played by Seth Green, Breckin Meyer, Donald Faison, and Alexander Martin — even got an appearance on Robot Chicken this year, just weeks after the flurry of 20th anniversary activity brought the movie back into the headlines.

Matthew Libatique, who has been working with superstar director Darren Aranofsky since Pi and who has since been the cinematographer on movies like Iron Man and Birds of Prey and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn. The latter, with its bright colors and loud soundtrack, may owe a little of its DNA to Josie, although Libatique has said that he tries to approach each new project without looking back.

Besides Josie and the Pussycats, the Peacock announcement reveals that The Flintstones in Viva Rock Vegas, a movie on which Kaplan and Elfont received a writing credit after doing a polish of the script, is coming to Peacock tomorrow, as well. Other highlights of the month include The Matrix Reloaded, The Matrix Revolutions, Lost in Translation, and Scott Pilgrim vs. the World. 

You can get the 20th anniversary Blu-ray of Josie and the Pussycats at Amazon.