CBR: Kevin Smith's "Bionic Man" Debuts at Dynamite

[CBR News]

Kevin Smith, Phil Hester and Jonathan Lau have reteamed to bring "The Bionic Man" to comics in a new Dynamite Entertainment series based a script Smith wrote in 1998 for a "Six Million Dollar Man" movie.


Full article here.

[goof]

Could there be a bionic Steve Austin vs Stone Cold Steve Austin crossover in the future?

[boyhangover]

Not bad. I like the idea of them taking his old scripts and making them comics. Has he dones anything else (aside from the Superman Script) that could be adapted. I'd like to see the superman script get adapted some how. The Giant Spider Fight and the rasseling polar bears would be epic.

[goof]

I wonder what other old scripts Kevin Smith has lying around?

[Janissa]

Is EVERYTHING bionic? ; )

[AdamYJ]

The Six Million Dollar Man is one of the coolest original superhero properties invented for television.

Um, I actually believe the Steve Austin character was originally created for a novel entitled Cyborg. Not sure though. I'll have to look that one up.

[Ed Love]

Um, I actually believe the Steve Austin character was originally created for a novel entitled Cyborg. Not sure though. I'll have to look that one up.

Yeah, written by Martin Caidin. He also wrote several sequels. His character was a little different though.

[jsf]

So if the current creative team of Green Hornet is now switching to the Bionic Man, what does it mean for the former book?

I've quite enjoyed Green Hornet, but have to say this doesn't sound too good for that particular title.

[vitruvian]

Yeah, written by Martin Caidin. He also wrote several sequels. His character was a little different though.

Yep, Steve Austin first appeared in Martin Caidin's Cyborg and the sequels like Operation Nuke, but was quite different from the Steve Austin to eventually appear on the TV show.

1) The book's Austin was a bit of a polymath and ubermensch to begin with - not only an astronaut, but multiple Ph.D.s and black belts and other qualifications. Prime material for the process after his accident.

2) The replacement eye didn't let him actually see with it, because they had no way to stimulate the optic nerve, but did contain a useful camera.

3) Since his legs weren't replaced all the way to and past the hips, and so many parts of his body were still fleshy, he couldn't run at better than 60 mph, but only a little faster than before. However, he had massive endurance because he was essentially 'riding' his tireless legs rather than actually running.

4) For the same reasons, he couldn't really lift terribly massive weights, or he would put too much pressure on his flesh and bone (although somewhat reinforced) spinal column. He could still crush and hit things with the bionic hand like anybody's business, though.

5) Which he did with great aplomb, because the Steve Austin of the books was not at all reluctant about killing enemies of the US, whether by karate chop with the steel bar in his bionic hand, a poison dart from that same arm, or just plain shooting the suckers.

[Ramage]

Yeah, but did he have a red knob sticking out of his back that you could pump and he'd lift his arm with a engine in its grip. And Oscar Goldman came with an exploding breifcase.

Too cool.

[hugosleestak]

Thanks to Vitruvian for all of the "Cyborg" novel reminders. It's been a long time since I've read that. My copy had the nifty Boris Vallejo cover, obviously based (as this Smith stuff is) on the TV adaptation. I'm just kind of sad that I don't recall Martin Caidin being mentioned even once in the article. Or did I miss it somewhere? It's sort of like that movie of "A Princess of Mars" that came out a few years ago and didn't mention Edgar Rice Burroughs at all. It was cheesy and low budget (like the Burroughs adaptations in the 1970's, like "At the Earth's Core"), but like "Bionic Man" it's too bad there wasn't any credit at all. Weird.

[vitruvian]

Thanks to Vitruvian for all of the "Cyborg" novel reminders. It's been a long time since I've read that. My copy had the nifty Boris Vallejo cover, obviously based (as this Smith stuff is) on the TV adaptation. I'm just kind of sad that I don't recall Martin Caidin being mentioned even once in the article. Or did I miss it somewhere? It's sort of like that movie of "A Princess of Mars" that came out a few years ago and didn't mention Edgar Rice Burroughs at all. It was cheesy and low budget (like the Burroughs adaptations in the 1970's, like "At the Earth's Core"), but like "Bionic Man" it's too bad there wasn't any credit at all. Weird.

If there wasn't any acknowledgement of ERB anywhere at all in the credits, I'd think the studio involved would have gotten sued out of existence by the estate, honestly. It's certainly possible that people skipped over it in reviews and felt they were doing a favor to the original source material in doing so, though - I mean, geez, Traci Lords and Antonio Sabato?

[DonC]

Is EVERYTHING bionic? ; )

It's Kevin Smith. You know there's going to be a bionic dong joke in there somewhere.

[Kikaider]

I hope it is going to have a lot of fantasy elements like fighting robots and bionic bigfoot, and aliens. I'm not really interested in reading a crime drama Bionic Man series. Would be good if the bionic parts were tied to an "anchor" piece in another dimension so he could lift things and do things that wouldn't impact his human parts. Will need to see a preview before I am on board with this one.

[boyhangover]

I'm not worried about losing Hester off GH. Smith was already done. I reread Smith's Daredevil recently and came to the decision he would write an awesome Dr. Strange mini.