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Oscar-winning writer John Ridley has revealed he was working on a "weird" Eternals TV show for Marvel – years before the movie was released.
Ridley, who won an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay for his work on 12 Years a Slave, told the Comic Book Club podcast (H/T Variety), "My version was the good version. It was so fucking weird. There was my version, a good version, which is good to me… There was the version that [Marvel] ended up doing, which I don’t think that version was particularly good. I’ll be honest."
Aside from throwing slight shade at Eternals, Ridley also outlined the bizarre way his series would have begun.
"The first thing you see is a young man, probably about 18 years old. And he’s sitting there and then he lifts his hands. He has a drill in it. And he turns the drill on and he puts the drill to his ear and he starts pushing it in," Ridley explained. He added, however, that he isn’t sure it would have been a surefire hit on ABC.
"The best thing to happen for everybody was that it didn’t happen with me, because I don’t know that it would have been entertaining," Ridley admitted.
The Chloe Zhao-directed 2021 MCU movie starred Gemma Chan, Richard Madden, Barry Keoghan, Angelina Jolie, Brian Tyree Henry, Kumail Nanjiani, Salma Hayek, Lauren Ridloff, Don Lee, and Lia McHugh as a group of superpowered, ancient protectors of Earth. Reviews for Eternals were largely mixed – and audience reaction was similarly lukewarm, with the Marvel Phase 4 project grossing $400 million at the box office.
For all the latest on Marvel, check out our guide to upcoming Marvel movies and a wider look at Marvel Phase 5.
