Disney’s Live-Action Gargoyles Reboot Gets Long-Awaited Update (Exclusive)

The Gargoyles are awakening at Disney+. In 2023, it was reported that the streamer was developing a live-action reboot of the ’90s animated series about the Manhattan clan of Gargoyles — mighty Goliath (voiced by Keith David), wizened Hudson (Ed Asner), techie Lexington (Thom Adcox-Hernandez), wiseguy Brooklyn (Jeff Bennett), bulky Broadway (Bill Fagerbakke), the dog-like beast Bronx (Frank Welker), and later, Goliath’s daughter, Angela (Brigitte Bako) — who were frozen in stone by a magic spell for a thousand years. In modern-day Manhattan, they lived again as stone by day, warriors by night, defending New York City with their human ally, N.Y.P.D. Detective Elisa Maza (Salli Richardson).

According to Gary Dauberman, the writer, executive producer, and showrunner of the live-action Gargoyles reboot, Disney is still chiseling away at getting the series off the ground.

“I feel like we have the animated series already. The cartoon is so good,” Dauberman tells ComicBook in an interview pegged to the Until Dawn movie. “It’s so good. That’s what we fell in love with. I think it lends itself to a really cool live-action version.”

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Adapting Gargoyles for live-action “will be challenging,” but Dauberman says they are “talking to some great people. We are still keeping that darkness to it. I’m excited to see the animated [series] come to life.”

Gargoyles aired 78 episodes over three seasons between 1994 and 1997, with an 11-issue Marvel Comics series taking flight in 1995. The story of the Manhattan Clan continued as recently as 2022 in a new Dynamite comic series penned by the TV show’s co-creator and producer, Greg Weisman, but Dauberman “can’t get into specifics” about whether the live-action version is adapting any particular story.

“I think Disney would kill me. I am such a fan of the show and there is so much good in it,” says Dauberman, a screenwriter who has adapted the works of author Stephen King (the It films and 2024’s ‘Salem’s Lot remake) and PlayStation’s Until Dawn video game into a feature film.

Whether it’s adapting Stephen King, a horror video game, or an animated series such as Gargoyles, Dauberman says, “[In] one, you have to invent stuff whole cloth and the other you don’t. I will say that if you are a fan of the show, you will be very happy with how I’m not trying to reinvent the wheel with that one.”

Disney Branded Television is developing Gargoyles with Atomic Monster’s James Wan and Michael Clear, producers of the Swamp Thing series adapted for television by Dauberman and Mark Verheiden in 2019. Dauberman’s screenwriting credits include the hit Conjuring spinoffs Annabelle and The Nun, and most recently, he co-wrote and produced Sony’s Until Dawn movie.