John Ridley Confirms His Secret Scrapped Marvel TV Show Was Eternals, "But Good"

A number of Marvel Comics characters and concepts have made their way to the small screen, from broadcast shows on ABC and Freeform to streaming programs on platforms like Disney+ and Netflix. Back in the mid-2000s, 12 Years a Slave and American Crime's John Ridley was confirmed to be developing a secret Marvel TV project, only for it to not come to fruition in any way. Fans have been curious about the specifics of Ridley's now-scrapped project, and he just revealed a lot of unexpected details. In a recent interview on the Comic Book Club podcast, Ridley finally confirmed that his secret Marvel TV project was focused around the Eternals, a group of superpowered beings who prevent the universe from being destroyed by cosmic forces. As Ridley put it, his TV adaptation would have been "the good version" of the source material, which was ultimately adapted into the 2021 film Eternals by Chloe Zhao.

"It's not in the works anymore," Ridley revealed. "It was a television version of The Eternals… But good.... My version was the good version. It was so f-cking weird. There was my version, a good version, which is good to me, which — that doesn't mean anything. There was the version that [Marvel] ended up doing, which I don't think… that version was particularly good. I'll be honest."

What Would John Ridley's Eternals Have Been About?

As Ridley revealed in the same interview, his version of Eternals would have leaned more heavily into the weirdness of the Jack Kirby-created characters, and the take he presented was received by Marvel with a mixed response, as it is a "really hard property to develop." 

"My version started with, the first thing you see is a young man, probably about 18 years old," Ridley explained. "And he's sitting there. He's sitting there for a moment. And then he lifts his hands. He has a drill in it. And he turns the drill on. And he puts the drill to his ear. And he starts pushing it in. And then it goes from there. That's the start, right? That's how it starts. And then I think you see… another kid… He sleeps in the bathtub, covers himself with foil. It's just a really weird story about these people who are, I mean, it's just weird."

"The best thing to happen for everybody was that it didn't happen with me, because I don't know that it would have been entertaining," Ridley added. "And I do mean what's entertaining to me is often not entertaining. Populist, which is great for a lot of the work I do, but this needed to be a little bit more popular."

Will There Be an Eternals 2?

Amid a mixed critical response and an underwhelming box office performance, an Eternals sequel has yet to officially be greenlit by Marvel Studios, despite reports from some of the film's cast indicating that it might be on the way. Zhao, meanwhile, has taken a diplomatic approach to the possibility.

"No comment," Zhao said in an interview earlier this year. "When you're in Marvel and when you're dealing with an audience that big, I truly treasure and respect that each of us is so unique. It's exciting that we're all so different, and we're all changing and growing every day. But with a global audience, it's almost impossible to make everybody perfectly happy, and to do that is to say that everyone is the same. So I think there's inevitably going to be that [difference of opinion], and you just have to stay true to the kind of film you want to make and who you are and the people you're collaborating with. That's all you can do, really, and have a good time. Everything else is out of your control."

What do you think of John Ridley's new comments about his scrapped Eternals project? Would you have wanted to see it come to fruition? Share your thoughts with us in the comments below!