Hivemind today announced a new partnership with William M. Gaines Agent, Inc., the proprietors of EC Comics, for a number of film and television projects based on the tremendously influential, often controversial, comic book publisher William M. Gaines.
One of the partnership’s first endeavors will be Weird Fantasy, a new television show inspired by the shocking and subversive sci-fi/fantasy series that mixed together genre storytelling with socially conscious themes including equality, anti-war advocacy, nuclear disarmament and ecological preservation, creating some of the most hotly debated comic book stories ever produced.
“The story of William Gaines is the secret history of American pop culture,” said Hivemind’s Hunter Gorinson. “The ideas he presented in the pages of Mad, Tales from the Crypt, Weird Fantasy and so many more would inspire and incite revolutionary countercultures around the globe for decades to come. As a veteran of the comics industry myself and a lifelong fan of EC, it’s a tremendous honor to be working alongside the Gaines family to help bring his story – which has an immense amount to tell us about our own modern moment – to a new generation on the big screen.“
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Additionally, a feature film based on the life of Gaines, the former EC Comics publisher and self-styled comics provocateur who challenged the rigid moral code of 1950s America. He was so good at it that his company investigated by Congress and his books burned in the streets in the wake of EC Comics’ staggering success. The film will follow Gaines’ transformation from New York publishing impresario to counterculture hero and champion of the First Amendment.
There was a biopic of Gaines in the work a number of years ago, titled Ghoulishly Yours, William M. Gaines, with John Landis (An American Werewolf in London) attached to direct. However, the project failed to manifest.
Both Weird Fantasy and the as-yet-untitled biopic will be produced Gaines’ daughter and grandson, Cathy Mifsud and Corey Mifsud for EC, alongside Dinesh Shamdasani, Sean Daniel, Jason F. Brown and Gorinson for Hivemind. The company, which pairs high-level creative talent and globally recognized properties, is currently involved in the adaptation of Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, as well as Amazon’s The Expanse and Netflix’s The Witcher.
