With Disney/Marvel and Warner Bros./DC carving up the cinematic landscape with their film-stocked universes, Sony’s attempt to build something similar around Spider-Man has rather stumbled. The studio is hoping that an infusion of talent to work on the projects it has in development with Valiant Entertainment will help it construct something a little more solid. Targeted as first out of the gate? Bloodshot**, which boasts John Wick directors David Leitch and Chad Stahelski{
Bloodshot, which first hit shelves via Valiant in 1992, follows Angelo Mortalli, a former mob hitman double-crossed by the family and framed for murder. Taken into witness protection, he’s betrayed again, this time by the FBI agent who was assigned to guard him, and kidnapped as part of a secret government program. His mind is wiped clean (so they think) and he’s infused with nanites to turn him into a super soldier with inhuman strength and healing ability. Naturally, some of his memories start to return at the wrong moment, making him one big liability.
Leitch and Stahelski are developing the film, working from a script by Kick-Ass 2’s Jeff Wadlow and Thing reboot writer Eric Heisserer. Matthew Vaughn, who was briefly interested in the project a few years ago, will be among the movie’s executive producers.
And then there’s Harbinger, which Heisserer is writing alone and is still to announce a director. The plot focuses on a group of super-powered people on the run from a shadowy organization called the Harbinger Foundation. It was created by Jim Shooter and David Lapham, with Sony picking up the rights to adapt Valiant's titles in 2012.
The plan, which is being overseen by **Fast And Furious **franchise producers Neal H. Moritz and Toby Jaffe, is for the characters to power two films each and then meet up for a fifth, using Valiant’s 2013 comics crossover Harbinger Wars as inspiration.
Bloodshot is taking aim at a 2017 release, with the rest, Sony hopes, following in due course.