Valiant Releases Trailer for Bloodshot, Their First Movie

Like any corporate comic publisher, Valiant really wants to be making movies. Their first film, Bloodshot, opens in February 2020, and the trailer is now available.

(Update: The release date for the movie is now March 13, 2020.)

I previously didn’t know anything about the character, but (and given the name, this shouldn’t surprise me) he looks like a memory-wiped super-soldier type, a magically healing violent weapon who wants to discover the truth about his past. So casting Vin Diesel seems right for this Wolverine/Robocop mashup. (Personally, I’d rather see more of Guy Pearce as the I-think-he’s-the-bad-guy.)

By the way, here’s how Valiant promotes themselves:

Valiant Entertainment, a subsidiary of DMG Entertainment, founded by Dan Mintz, is a leading character-based entertainment company that owns and controls the third most extensive library of superheroes behind Marvel and DC. With more than 80 million issues sold and a library of over 2,000 characters, including X-O Manowar, Bloodshot, Harbinger, Shadowman, Archer & Armstrong, and many more, Valiant is one of the most successful publishers in the history of the comic book medium.

Sounds about right — although I couldn’t tell you anything about any of those characters. And success always depends on how you define it. The Bloodshot comic series just relaunched in September, with issue #2 coming out this past week. All the Valiant comics I’ve tried I’ve found generic and mediocre, but I’m not looking for another superhero universe of any kind.

If you’d like to read about the hero before the film, there’s a Definitive Edition collection that reprints issues #0-13 from 2012, written by Duane Swierczynski and Matt Kindt and illustrated by nine artists, including Barry Kitson.