Prophet, a character created by Rob Liefeld, first appeared in the pages of 1992's Youngblood #2. He's since gone on to star in his own series (multiple times), though talk of a movie featuring the character first began in the mid-1990s.
Nothing really happened until back in 2018 when Studio 8 acquired the rights, with it later being revealed that the script would be penned by Arrow and Legends of Tomorrow scribe Marc Guggenheim. Things only got more exciting with the addition of Extraction director Sam Hargrave and the news that Jake Gyllenhaal (Ambulance) would star as the title character.
We haven't heard much since then, but Liefeld has shared a big update during a recent interview with ComicBook.com.
"Jake has come on as a producer. The draft that is being completed right now is a polish of the second act. There was one sequence that was added, that everyone was like 'How did we never think of that?' Prophet is like...I wish I could share the screenplay with everybody," he says. "It's that old adage: if it's not on the page, it's not on the screen."
Marc Guggenheim, his draft got us Sam Hargrave, got us Jake Gyllenhaal. That's how good the paper is...but we always knew, Jake was always making Road House right now. Sam was never going to be done with Extraction 2, even a year ago, there was an additional 13, 14 months. So we're extremely excited."
"In the business of movies, you just hope that your important contributors stay on board, and as of today, Jake is fully engaged, giving notes, taking meetings, shaping the movie, and Sam is in his free time away from Extraction 2, has continued to shape it," Liefeld adds. "I am super excited, I don't want to jinx it, but it is a big deal."
This all sounds extremely promising and, right now, there's really no reason to believe this movie won't finally become a reality. That's an impressive group of people who are working on it, anyway, and the hope now is that it will be the next project Hargrave and Gyllenhaal decide to tackle.
Liefeld's work is often divisive among comic book fans, but he's created a lot of great characters over the years and Prophet is definitely worthy of a big screen outing.
Are you excited about this take on Prophet?