In 1995, director Bryan Singer’s second feature length film, The Usual Suspects won acclaim from audiences and critics. The film featured an ensemble cast that included Kevin Spacey, Kevin Pollak, Benicio Del Toro, Stephen Baldwin and Gabriel Byrne, in addition one of the most famous twist endings in cinema history.
While The Usual Suspects doesn’t seem like a story ripe for comic book spinoffs, Red 5 Comics appears to believe otherwise. Beginning next year, Red 5 Comics and Singer’s Bad Hat Harry Productions will begin producing Unusual Suspects comic books.
The first of the newly announced comics will be Keyser Soze: Scorched Earth, a story written by Red 5 Comics founder Paul Ens. The miniseries will follow the infamous Keyser Soze nine years before The Usual Suspects as he rises to the top of the drug trade during President Ronald Reagan’s war on drugs.
Clearly Ens, Singer and others involved with this project believe in it. But The Usual Suspects was a very complete story that didn’t need the backstory neatly laid out. Imagine a company announcing the comic rights to Citizen Kane and then producing a miniseries about Kane and his beloved Rosebud that took place in the past. That’s pretty much what this sounds like.
But perhaps Ens will prove us wrong when Keyser Soze: Scorched Earth # 1 debuts in 2016.
CraveOnline readers: what do you think about Unusual Suspect comics? Good idea? Great idea? Set it on fire? Lay down your judgment below!
