The Spectre May Be Headed To CONSTANTINE, Spinoff Series In The Cards

A lot of information was revealed yesterday about NBC’s upcoming DC series Constantine, from the casting of his new female ally to the status on his smoking and bisexuality. However, as with any adaptation of a comic book series, what hardcore fans really look forward to is the references to other DC characters. Not only will there be half a dozen DC Comics Easter Eggs in the pilot, including Doctor Fate’s helmet, but executive producer David Goyer stated that characters would be introduced on the show that have the potential to spinoff into their own series.

The intention is that we have DC’s occult universe open to us and the fact that we had Doctor Fate’s helmet in the pilot is an indication that we’re going to be doing that. We’re introducing another character from the DC universe within the first eight or nine episodes as well.

Who is this character in question? In a follow-up from IGN, executive producer Daniel Cerone that it will be none other than The Spectre, although it’s still not 100% guaranteed. Citing that they’re still in the “early creative discussions,” police officer Jim Corrigan is being planned for episode five. In the comics, Corrigan is killed in the line of duty and is reincarnated as The Spectre, the spirit of vengeance. According to Cerone, within this episode, they have need for a police officer who can see these supernatural evils, and Corrigan is a great fit.

So it’s a perfect opportunity for us, because we can name this character Jim Corrigan and within our story, for the general viewer, that works, because now Constantine has a friend on the force. For the comic book fan, ‘My god, that’s Jim Corrigan!’ And we can get back to that character and can slowly develop that character and who knows, maybe there’s an opportunity in the future to even see the origin story unfold within the framework of our TV series. It creates opportunities and creatively you just have to go in and lay that groundwork in and try and let it unfold naturally. So we’re in the midst of approvals on that, but that’s one idea we’re exploring right now.

While the goal right now is to make sure Constantine is successful, Goyer says that the “sky’s the limit” on giving The Spectre a spinoff. Believe it or not, this isn’t the first time a Spectre TV show has been proposed. Back in 2011, Fox proposed a Spectre series, but much like their Deadman series, along with SyFy’s Booster Gold and The CW’s Amazon, nothing ever came of it. The Spectre has also appeared in a couple episodes of Batman: The Brave and the Bold, Smallville and his own animated short attached to Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths.

With the DC movies primed to mostly focus on the A-listers, TV shows are probably the only way we’ll get to see substantial live-action versions of our favorite C-list characters. Arrow and The Flash are already doing this, so seeing The Spectre on Constantine would be amazing! Granted, I agree with the show runners that Constantine needs to be able to stand on its own first, but if there’s a mystical DC character who could hold his own show, it’s The Spectre. He would travel across the world, punish those who hurt the innocent, collect snow globes from each location he visits…what, even God’s Wrath likes to collect mementos, right?

SOURCE: IGN