According to Deadline, Netflix has just signed a seven-figure deal with comic book creator Rob Liefeld for the rights to his Extreme Universe, an Image Comic brand featuring Liefeld-created superheroes with shoulder pads, non-existent feet, and suitably extreme names like Bloodstrike, Bloodwulf, Cybrid, and Kaboom (all of which are real, even if they seem like jokes). Netflix’s plan is to develop a “series of feature films” about Liefeld’s Extreme characters that will have “connective tissue,” which is a generic way of saying “it’ll be a cinematic universe.”
If Liefeld’s involvement alone isn’t exciting enough, these Extreme Universe movies will be led by Akiva Goldsman, the inexplicably successful Hollywood screenwriter who has had a hand in tons of bad movies over the last few decades. Goldsman is setting up a writers’ room to plan out what this “connective tissue” will be, so at least he won’t be single-handedly dragging these movies down.
The idea of Liefeld’s Extreme characters getting a cinematic universe was first floated more than a year ago, after Goldsman began developing an adaptation of Liefeld’s killer naked angel comic Avengelyne.