Aaron Sorkin, renowned writer and creator of such all-time classics as the television show The West Wing and Oscar-nominated films like The Social Network and Moneyball, recently revealed in an exclusive interview with Comicbook.com that he will be engaging in talks with both Marvel and DC representatives about the possibility of developing one or more of their properties for large audiences.
However, Sorkin is cautious about his upcoming meetings with representatives of each studio because he admits that he has never read a comic.
“I happen to have meetings coming up with both DC and Marvel,” he said. “I have to go into these meetings and tell them as respectfully as I can that I’ve never read a comic book. It’s not that I don’t like them, it’s just that I’ve never been exposed to one. So, I’m hoping that somewhere in their library is a comic book character that I’m gonna love and I’m going to want to go back and start reading from the first issue on.”
It will be interesting to follow these meetings and their outcome because of the possibilities of what Sorkin and his brand of storytelling could do with the right property. Sorkin is known for his “walk and talk” style of storytelling where his characters are in constant movement around sets while engaging in quid pro quo exchanges of dialogue.
Many of Sorkin’s storytelling interests deal with very deep human interactions under strenuous circumstances. For example, The West Wing dealt with a large cast of fully fleshed out characters dealing with the mountainous task of governing the country or dealing with a courtship in the spotlight of politics, for that matter, evident in film The American President.
Sorkin has also been fascinated with genius and persons who have completely disrupted previously held norms with their creativity or inventions. Moneyball (written by Sorkin) is about Billy Beane who, as Executive Vice President of the Oakland Athletics baseball team changed the game of baseball with sabermetrics. Steve Jobs (written by Sorkin) is a biographical look at the man who changed the personal computer, and our relationship to them, forever. The Social Network is a courtroom procedural that looks at Mark Zuckerberg and the early development of Facebook and what transpired during the transcending social media giant’s infancy.
Could Sorkin end up working for DC or for Marvel or both? We will have to wait and see.
In this writer’s opinion, and as a long time follower of Sorkin’s, two properties in the DC universe come to mind that could be of interest to Sorkin if they are pitched properly to him. Both are Vertigo comics titles and have been critically renowned. The first is Y: The Last Man by Brian K. Vaughn and Pia Guerra. This book is about Yorick Brown and his monkey Ampersand as they end up being the last two males on the planet after a mysterious occurrence kills off all the other men on the planet. This book reveled in the character interactions under incredible circumstances with a thought-provoking premise that engaged readers with the possibilities of this social experiment.
The second book that comes to my mind is The Sheriff of Babylon by Tom King and Mitch Gerards. Former CIA employee Tom King brought his expertise to this tale about crime in the middle of a warzone. I believe this story may pique Sorkin’s interest as an opportunity to bring his love of dialogue, crime procedurals, and politics to the forefront of a hot button issue. Either one of these stories would benefit from Sorkin’s touch but my money would be on Sheriff out of the two.
Or he can just write the Aquaman script (Aquaman monthly readers know what I’m talking about) but I want to hear what our readers think. Leave a comment down below and let us know which DC property Sorkin should write.
