Guillermo Del Toro on the dark side of superheroes

When The Avengers went on to make megabucks at the box office, you just knew there would be more superhero teams headed to the big screen.

Justice League, which had stalled at Warner Brothers, was brought out of development hell, and along with the many projects Guillermo Del Toro has in the works, he also has a dark superhero team up called Heaven Sent. 

With Del Toro being Del Toro, this would clearly be the dark side of the Avengers, which is an intriguing concept.  The comic characters in this film would include one of our personal favorites, Swamp Thing, along with Constantine Hellblazer, Etrigan the Demon, and more. 

So what’s the latest with this project? Well Del Toro has Pacific Rim coming out on July 12, then he’s doing his haunted house movie, Crimson Peak, so Heaven Sent could be a ways in the future. At the same time, Del Toro told Total Film that the Heaven Sent project is “going really really well” so far, and “It’s like meeting old friends.”

As Del Toro continued, “I grew up with Demon Etrigan, with Swamp Thing, with Deadman, so these are characters that are near and ear to my heart. I’d love to use the origins that are proper to each character. I love the idea of Jason Blood as a paladin and a knight…I love the entire Constantine mythology, the Dead Man mythology, the Alex Holland Swamp Thing mythology. These are really rich things to well and to dig.” 

A line up of dark heroes instead of the standard issue, all American ones could be really cool, and much different than the usual comic blockbuster. And with Justice League stuck in the mud again, now could be a good time for Heaven Sent if Warner Brothers could get it set up.

“I am going to be presenting my storyline to DC and Warners of where I want to take this universe,” Del Toro said. “I hope it happens.” So do we, especially to see Swamp Thing again. The big green, leafy guy is long overdue for a reboot, and Del Toro’s a great guy to bring him back.