Turns out that Dwayne Johnson, The Peoples Champion, the Rock is in talks with MGM about starring in Hercules. The film which is to be directed by Brett Ratner; who directed the comedians version of the Expendables. I believe it was called Tower Heist.

The film is based on the Hercules comic book by Radical Publishing. They have two series which are called, “Hercules: The Thracian Wars” and “Hercules: The Knives of Kush.” The last one just makes me think there are blades made of marijuana. Both series are written by Steve More with artist Cris Bolsin.

The Thracian Wars is described as follows:

“Fourteen-hundred years ago, a tormented soul walked the Earth that was neither man nor god. Hercules, powerful son of the god king Zeus, received nothing but suffering his entire life. After twelve arduous labors and the loss of his family, this dark, world-weary soul turned his back on the gods, finding his only solace in bloody battle. Over the years he warmed to the company of six similar souls, their only bond being their love of fighting and the presence of death. These men and woman never question where, why, or whom they go to fight; only how much they will be paid. Knowing this, the King of Thrace has hired these mercenaries to train his men to become the greatest army of all time. Hercules begins to question King Cotys’ motives when he takes his army out to battle and sees them practice on innocent men, women, and children of their neighbors. Deep in his soul something stirs, but is it enough to stop a mad king and his army of the damned from marching across Greece – or even Olympus itself?!”

So if I’m to understand this correctly, Hercules roamed the earth in seventh century as an emo, laying the smack down for Kings while the Thracians were being wiped out by Goths. It’s okay, I’ll suspend my belief on this because I too have watched Marvel’s Thor film adaptation. I can’t believe I paid to see that either though.

This might be MGM’s bid to find their own Conan movie for reinvention, but I’m skeptical about Ratner more than I am about The Rock; sure it puts the movie at risk for being associated with the Scorpion King, but “you keep what you kill” and man did that movie die horribly.

So what’s wrong with Ratner? He’s done a great job directing Red Dragon and an X-Men movie, but he’s also been the force behind the Rush Hour movies. While the Radical Comics Hercules title does look serious, it’s still a comic. The comedic moments makes me wonder if if any Rush Hour will leak a bit into the film.  Maybe it’ll just have to take a really good script to really tell.

Hey, is it my imagination or does Hercules on these covers look a little like a time lost Judge Dredd?