Right?
Well, just to refresh all our memories, Man-Thing is the creation of Stan Lee, Roy Thomas, Gerry Conway and Gray Morrow, (that’s right, it took four people to come up with this one), and the character made his debut in Savage Tales #1 in May of 1971. The story goes that scientist Dr. Ted Sallis was working on recreating the Super Soldier Serum used on Captain America (something tells me Marvel won’t be making this part of their film continuity anytime soon) in Florida when, like an idiot, he ignores all the security protocols to allow his lover into the lab. She betrays him (turns out she works of the terrorist group AIM), but Sallis quickly destroys his notes, injects himself with a work in progress version of the formula, and accidentally crashes his car into the swap. Thanks to the serum and magic (apparently), he becomes the Man-Thing, a silent planet creature that secretes some sort of acid when he is around people in fear. Or something.
The character would go on to star in his own solo title in 1973, which was cancelled 22 issues later. He then received a solo title again in 1979...which was also cancelled. The character then proceeded to show up in a bunch of guest starring spots throughout the 1980s and 1990s before featuring in a few mini-series in the 2000s. These days, he is apparently a cast member of the current version of the Thunderbolts:
But don’t let that history of failure and obscurity in the comics fool you; Man-Thing has appeared in plenty of other media which testify to his popularity! Like…um…well, apparently he was featured in an episode of something called The Super Hero Squad Show:
So there’s that. And, um….oh! The character appears in Marvel Vs. Capcom 3! Not as a playable character, but in an ending cut scene:
Good to see you again Blade!
Anyways, that is about it for Man-Thing. But just because this week's film is a Sci-Fi Channel original featuring an obscure Marvel character doesn’t mean it has to be terrible, right? I mean, let’s look at the director Brett Leonard’s credits. For starters, he directed a music video for Peter Gabriel which I cannot embed by itself for some reason. I can, however, embed the version which includes a brief look at the making of the music video, so we get to see Mr. Leonard himself:
Alright, I’ll grant that is one of the weakest videos Gabriel was ever in, but it was OK. And besides, after that, Leonard went on to direct Lawnmower Man, the film Stephen King took his name off of because it completely ignored his short story:
And then Leonard went on to direct the 1995 film Virtuosity, which was…OK:
After that...um no, nothing I recognize...come on, come on, there has to be something else he has done worthing noting. What about his post-Man-Thing credits…
Oh.
Oh no.
No.
NO!
I'm....going to hold back my rant on that one. For now.
So yeah, tune in next episode as we discuss Man-Thing and live to regret it:
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