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George Lucas Thinks Marvel Will Remake Howard The Duck

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George Lucas has predicted that the film widely regarded the biggest mistake of his entire career - ‘Howard the Duck’ - will at some point be remade by Marvel Studios.

The 70-year old ‘Star Wars’ creator told the audience at the Tribeca Film Festival (quotes via The Hollywood Reporter), “I have a feeling that Marvel’s gonna redo it because of the technology they have today.

“I told the producer and writer [of the 1986 original] it’s not gonna work. … You can’t put a dwarf in a duck suit and make it work!” Of today’s technology he comments, “It’s a digital duck. When you have a digital duck, you can do anything. You can make it act.“

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Lucas’s remarks would seem to be at least in part based on the very brief post-credits cameo from the unorthodox Marvel Comics character in ‘Guardians of the Galaxy,’ although James Gunn and others have strenuously denied this was in any way intended as the set-up to a new ‘Howard the Duck’ movie. However, the character’s revived popularity has seen Marvel relaunch him in a new comic of his own.

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Whilst George Lucas may deflect responsibility for the ‘Howard the Duck’ movie now, history looks back on the film as his folly alone. Lucas oversaw production on the Universal Pictures release via his company Lucasfilm, having long harboured the desire to bring Steve Gerber and Val Mayerick’s anarchic character to the screen.

He entrusted the project to director Willard Huyck and producer Gloria Katz, also co-writers responsible for the screenplay of ‘Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom’ - but to say this film did not wind up such a success is a significant understatement.

Torn to shreds by critics and ignored by audiences, it was the biggest flop Lucasfilm had ever seen, and was quickly accepted as one of the worst movies ever made. Willard Huyck, perhaps unsurprisingly, has never directed again.

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However, as with so many films to earn the label of worst ever made - ‘Plan 9 From Outer Space,’ ‘Showgirls,’ ‘Troll 2’ - there has long been a certain cult status afforded to ‘Howard the Duck,’ as Lucas himself remarks, noting that terribly reviewed films sometimes “float up to the surface of the lake, and then they become cult classics. … It means you made an interesting movie or a weird movie, and a small group of people love it.”

‘Howard the Duck’ certainly is weird, and as such there is definitely plenty that’s interesting about it - even if it’s just that it leaves you gobsmacked that it ever got made at all.

The fact that it centres on a cigar-chewing, wisecracking anthropomorphic duck is one thing. There’s also the matter of the relationship that sparks up between Howard and Lea Thompson’s new wave rocker Beverly, which - how best to put this - borders on the supremely inappropriate, particularly in a PG-rated movie.

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Nor is this the only non-PG friendly element in ‘Howard the Duck,’ given moments featuring topless female duck-women, and a used condom in Howard’s wallet.

Had the film been intended exclusively for adults, this might have been fine (relatively speaking) - but ‘Howard the Duck’ is geared toward the standard Lucas family audience, hence it also encompasses a struggle with a monstrous alien which takes over the body of Jeffrey Jones’s scientist. There’s also an embarrassing early turn from the latterly acclaimed Tim Robbins.

Still, for those with an appreciation of that sort of ridiculously over-the-top cinema that could only have been made in the 1980s, ‘Howard the Duck’ is most definitely not without entertainment value. While it may bewilder and flabbergast, it’s never boring - and, as ever with Lucas productions, the special effects are terrific (silly-looking duck suit notwithstanding).

It’s also a curious landmark in that - as hard as this may be to believe now - it’s one of the first theatrically released movies adapted from a Marvel comic, along with ‘Red Sonja’ (now owned by Dynamite Comics) in 1984, and ‘The Punisher’ in 1989.

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‘Guardians of the Galaxy’ proved, via Rocket Raccoon and Groot, that Marvel Studios can today make bona fide big screen heroes out of even the least likely characters - including talking animals.

Still, does this mean we should expect a new take on ‘Howard the Duck’ anytime soon? You’ll forgive us for not holding our breath here…

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Picture Credit: Lucasfilm, Marvel