Blumhouse Confirms It Is Still Developing ‘Spawn’

Despite its twenty-plus-year development cycle, Spawn is still in the works at Blumhouse.

In an interview with Inverse (via The Playlist), Blumhouse boss Jason Blum addressed the project — which at one point was set to go before cameras with Jaime Foxx as the titular hellspawn, Jeremy Renner as Twitch and Spawn creator Todd McFarlane making his directorial debut — and its more recent delays. “It’s taken longer than I hoped it would have to get the story right, but we’re still working on it,” Blum said.

He also called the original comic book the “last great unexploited comic” and that the film will be quite “edgy” when it finally emerges from development hell.

Spawn first debuted in 1992 as a premiere Image Comics title. By 1995, it in was in development as a feature and the result of that effort, 1997’s Spawn, was … well, not what anyone hoped for, really. From the moment the film left theaters, McFarlane promised a darker sequel more akin to a monster movie than a superhero flick. He has been promising this film ever since, although it did change from a sequel to a reboot sometime in the 2000s.

As always, the sticking point seems to be the story. McFarlane wants to do it his way, which no doubt scares investors interested in something more like Batman than Freddy Krueger. In fact, McFarlane alluded to an investor pulling out as the real reason for the most recent delay. Foxx recommitted to the project earlier this year, but it was unclear if Blumhouse was still part of the package.

Now that we know they are still on board, it would seemingly be a matter of time before Spawn finally goes before cameras again. Of course, those story issues may hold back Spawn for some time to come.