Sunday, February 22, 2015

What Might've Been: Painkiller Jane (2007)

Before beginning his run at Marvel Comics, Joe Quesada was running his own company, Event Comics, in the mid-90's, and produced just two series of note. One of them has been far more successful and visible----Painkiller Jane.

The story of detective turned vigilante Jane Vasko lasted through a 5 issue miniseries in 1995, leading to a number of crossovers with other companies, and even a motion picture franchise ("Terminator") over the next 13 years. In the midst of this, the Sci-Fi Channel (now SyFy) optioned a TV-movie, based on Quesada & Jimmy Palmiotti's miniseries, but completely deviating from the original concept.

2 years later, Jane returned, this time in a weekly series, with Kristianna Loken in the title role, which lasted just 1 season, but was closer in concept & scope to Palmiotti & Quesada's original vision.

Here's a sample clip:



Today, Dynamite Entertainment holds the comics rights to the series, rather than Marvel. However, it is the experience of developing the series that would explain, in some way, Quesada being involved with Marvel's TV arm, as co-executive producer for their animated series and Agents of SHIELD. However, overseeing the transition of his pride & joy to the small screen doesn't exactly qualify Quesada to be a competent TV executive, as demonstrated by his & Jeph Loeb's micromanaging of the cartoons at Marvel.

No rating. Never saw the show the 1st time around.

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