Do we have to do the rollcall once again? Fine. “He-Man.” “Voltron.” “Street Fighter.” “Green Arrow.” “Captain Nemo.” “Hack/Slash.” These are the names of pre-established properties that Justin Marks has helped pen in the last few years. The odd, Hollywood issue about this is that none of Marks’ scripts have been produced yet. Somehow, that hasn’t stopped him from raking in the dough on these for-hire gigs. With his first script, “Street Fighter: The Legend Of Chun-Li” turned into a movie that even Fox is embarassed of (a 1000+ theater release this weekend from a studio usually proud of their terrible movies), it’s unsure exactly how he’s getting these jobs- if bullshit merchant McG is to be believed, Marks’ reworked “20000 Leagues Under The Sea: Captain Nemo” has attracted Will Smith.
It looks like he might become an inhouse guy for the WB’s DC Comics film division, as he’s following up penning “Green Arrow: Escape From Super Max” with an adaptation of “Suicide Squad.” Derived from the second incarnation of the group that debuted in the eighties, the movie will follow a government organization of supercriminals employed by the government on suicide missions. The team has no trust in its leadership, however, as their mysterious employers were powerful enough to threaten to blackmail Batman with his secret identity if he didn’t stop investigating them. Blackmailing Batman, dude. The hook of the film seems to be “X-Men” meets “The Dirty Dozen,” which is as good as any when you’re a guy like Justin Marks.
Wikipedia claims that among the members of the team were villain heavyweights like Poison Ivy, Captain Boomerang, Deadshot and Shade the Changing Man (this is DC- these count as heavyweights), so it seems like, if DC is interested in building a cohesive onscreen universe a la Marvel Studios, they’ll use more than a couple of bigger villain names.