Grant Morrison: How “The Flash” Film Could Have Been the Next “Back to the Future”

In a recent interview with Collider, legendary comic book writer Grant Morrison opened up about his unused script for The Flash film, co-written by Flash star Ezra Miller. The duo teamed up a little over a year ago to pen a script for the superhero film, but Warner Bros. ultimately decided not to move forward with it.

Morrison talks a bit about how he and Miller tackled writing the script for The Flash, and while they were not able to get through many drafts, they both had a blast doing so.

“Yeah, I mean, Ezra Miller and I wrote that last year, but it kind of, you know what it’s like? It was just one of those things we all… Well, I thought we had a really good version of The Flash and we wrote it as fast as The Flash, because it was so demanding, and it was pretty good. And I think after a few drafts, it would have been great. But the way some studios work, these things just come and go. I think about 15 people have already written versions of The Flash. But it does seem to be going ahead now, but not with the version that we did. I had fun. Ezra came over to the house and we just had a real blast and created the story. And maybe one day the script will leak out into the world.”

Morrison also mentions how the film was originally more in line with Back to the Future rather than the more standard superhero movie we might be used to.

“Yeah, it was pretty good. I mean, I don’t know what they’re doing with it. But it was pretty good. And it was a very different kind of superhero thing. It was more like Back to the Future, I would say, than a superhero movie.”

With The Flash’s history with time travel in the comics, Back to the Future would have been a perfect inspiration for the Scarlet Speedster’s first outing on the big screen.

One of the rumored speed bumps production for The Flash faced was Miller’s alleged desire to make the film “darker”. According to Morrison, however, this was not the case.

“No, it wasn’t [darker] really. I mean, elements of darkness were there and the material that they wanted us to use [was] the Flashpoint stuff. So, Ezra and I were actually trying to do something that was a bit more —like I say, it’s kind of like just a great science-fiction story. And if you don’t know [the comics], it would have made sense. But I have to say, I mean, I don’t want to talk about that, because somebody else has done their own work on it and I’m sure it will be great. And maybe, as I say this will leak out one day and people can judge.”

While production on The Flash has had mishap after mishap, the film is in good hands now with IT‘s Andy Muschietti attached to direct and Birds of Prey‘s Christina Hodson tackling the script. Both Miller and Muschietti are making appearances at DC Fandome this August, so we can expect to hear more about The Flash very soon.

Sources: collider.com, comingsoon.net