You may not know the under-the-rader, indie comic Black by Kwanza Osajyefo, Tim Smith 3, Jamal Igle, Khary Randolph and others. But Hollywood hopes that’ll change soon. Studio 8, which has a distribution deal with Sony, just picked up the option for the comic with the hopes to turn it into a movie.
Black is about a world where only black people can have superhero powers. It’s a discovery made when a young man named Kareem Jenkins is racially profiled and shot by police, then gets up and lives to tell the tale. We debuted the first five pages of the Black Mask Studios project last year, which you can see here.
https://gizmodo.com/what-if-only-black-people-could-get-superpowers-1782512086
Described as X-Men meets The Wire, Black’s powerful premise makes it pretty obvious why Studio 8 would want the film options. The comic challenges its audience with upsetting social issues like racism and police brutality via a more accessible superhero construct. As well-liked as superhero movies are, they rarely stand for something, and Black definitely does that.
Deadline broke the news of the deal and they report Osajyefo and Smith 3 are on board as producers. There’s no news on a screenwriter yet but that would likely be the next step in getting Black to the big screen.
The comic series itself just finished its 6-issue run this week.
[Deadline]
