Nate Cosby and Chris Eliopoulus’ Cow Boy won’t be the only animated graphic novel adaptation coming our way.
Courtesy of Comic Book Resources and stemming from The Hollywood Reporter, we have learned that an animated film adaptation of writer and artist Noelle Stevenson’s popular webcomic Nimona has landed at Fox Animation (in what’s been described as a ‘competitive situation’). While this joins a number of projects under development at only Fox Animation and none of the other two animation companies under Fox’s tent (DreamWorks Animation and Blue Sky Studios), Nimona looks to be treated as a high priority project if the talent involved is any indication.
Patrick Osborne, a Disney alum who’s best known for his Oscar-winning short film Feast, is officially attached to direct. Marc Haimes, who co-wrote LAIKA’s next film Kubo and the Two Strings and was a former exec for DreamWorks, will write the screenplay. Roy Lee (of The LEGO Movie fame) will produce the film under his Vertigo Entertainment banner. Vertigo optioned the film rights to Nimona last month.
A unique hybrid of fantasy and sci-fi elements, Nimona began in 2012 while Stevenson was still attending the Maryland Institute College of Art (it was even her thesis). It was her first work to gain widespread attention and was even published in graphic novel form as part of a two-book deal with Harpercollins. One of her current works, Lumberjanes, is currently in development as a live-action film at 20th Century Fox as part of Boom! Studio’s film deal with the company.
Nimona takes place in a futuristic setting that derives its look from the medieval period (“knights go to night clubs riding hoverboards and carrying swords”). The plot revolves around “a young shape-shifter who teams up with a disgraced knight in order to reclaim his honor and overthrow a corrupt regime.”
Knowing how quirky the premise is, a comic like Nimona is perfect for an animated film adaptation. Nimona is also fairly genre-heavy and revolves around themes that are more challenging than your typical animated feature, so aside from translating Stevenson’s quaint, sketchy style, it will be interesting to see how the subject matter is translated to the big screen.
I would also like to point out that Stevenson herself also works in the world of animation, as she recently joined the writing team for the second season of Disney’s Wonder Over Yonder.
You can read the first three chapters of Nimona here.
What do you think? Are you interested in Nimona?
Edited by: Morgan Stradling
