A Gargoyles reboot is officially on the way. Months after a report suggested Kenneth Branagh could be helming a live-action reboot of the cult classic animated series, a new trade report says a live-action series is, in fact, in development at Disney+. While it doesn’t appear that Branagh is working on it, the series has a pair of monstrous names attached. Gary Dauberman has been hired to write, showrun, and executive produce the series alongside James Wan and his Atomic Monster banner.
Hopefully its decent. Personally I would rather an animated reboot, but I imagine theyre going live action to target an older audience.
Lately Ive kind of taken a bit of an indifferent approach to the onslaught of remakes, sequels, and series coming back from cancellation years later. If it’s good it’s good and thats neat. If not meh, I dont have to watch or engage with it and hopefully it dies a quick death. I kinda wish that Hollywood would focus more on new and original ideas instead of their focus on sequels, IP, and reboots, but that’s not going to change anytime soon.
At least Gargoyles has been off the air for about 30 years so it’s not like theyre beating a dead horse here. If done well it could be interesting and would be very possible to provide a fresh take. That said it being live action doesnt leave me feeling optimistic.
Yeah, going the live action route is a bit of a head-scratcher. Between two seasons of “Marvel’s What If…?” with third on the way and the upcoming X-Men '97 revival Disney clearly hasn’t shied away from animated shows aimed at older audiences. So I’m not sure why Gargoyles, of all things, would be getting the live action treatment.
I wonder if perhaps it’s because it’s a purely Disney product and theyre a little apprehensive of making an older skewing disney cartoon.
How old are we talking here? I was a youth when this show was airing (Disney afternoon) and still watch a ton of animation. I think the belief that animation is for kids is pretty dated and doesn’t hold true (not that you’re making that argument, but presuming that is what Disney execs believe)
Gargoyles was made to go head to head with batman tas and they both did a great job of going right to the end of the line of what a tv-y7 could get away with(and probably couldnt get away with today). That said like Batman they both were designed to target kids and for all the brilliance there were episodes that skewed a little younger, and little touches like how shows of that era had to dance around words like “kill”.
In addition to the usual stigmas surrounding animation I wonder if another factor in this is that it’s a pure Disney branded product. While they have plenty of edgier stuff in their back catalog that should let people know their cartoons arent just for small children, the rep is there and they may not be ready to put out a tv-14 or even tv-pg cartoon that targets young adults and teens. It was find when its some licensed anime on d+, or if it’s star wars or marvel, but this is a pure Disney badge.
Of course theres also the usual explanation of cost. Good animation costs a lot of money to produce and while lord knows disney has the cash it might be cheaper for them to just shoot this series in front of the giant tv. I feel like a show with characters like the gargoyales would be counter productive to be live action since they regularly fly, and would need expensive suits or full cgi anyway to work, but I suspect they do the math and no an effects guy is cheaper than a team of animators.