Wed Nov 5, 2008 — by Robert Greenberger

Paul Pope's 'Battling Boy' Optioned by Paramount

Book to see Print in 2010

Graphic artist Paul Pope’s Battling Boy has been optioned by Paramount Pictures for a feature film.  The movie will be produced by Brad Pitt's Plan B production company according to Variety.

The book, to be published by First Second in spring 2010, is a “gritty tale centers on the son of a god or superhero who comes down from the top of a mountain at his father's behest in order to rid a giant city of monsters.”

Publisher Mark Siegel first announced the project March 22, 2006, saying, “Yes, yes, yes, the rumors are true: Paul Pope is working on a massive, epic project for First Second -- in full color and for young readers.

“Here's a quote from Pope in this week's Publisher’s Weekly Comics Week, just to whet a few appetites:

‘Battling Boy is aimed at kids and it's coming out from First Second in 2007. It's a kind of a fairytale kid Beowulf, or a Peter Pan with teeth. It's set in a mythical city called Monstropolis, a city the size of a continent that's overrun with monsters.’”

Pope, a winner of multiple Eisner Awards, recently wrote on his blog, “In Batman Year 100, I had room for a couple of long fight sequences, but I felt cramped even with 200 pages. This fight scene from Battling Boy alone is about 50 pages. It's liberating to have no page restrictions. I wish [Jack] Kirby could've had 50 pages for one fight scene, imagine what he would've done.

“The extended cinematic sequence is one of the best gifts we've inherited from Manga.”

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