Newsblast Archive Dateline: May 1, 2000

Ben Edlund, creator of The Tick is working on a live-action Tick pilot. He updated the Tick newsgroup with a message titled "Unsolicited Propaganda from Ben Edlund Regarding the Tick Prime Time TV Show."

The pilot is finished shooting.

Our venomous reservations to name changes of Die Fledermaus and American Maid were not Edlund's fault.

The rights to those characters and some others that Edlund didn't name are still tied in with the Tick cartoon and unavailable for use in live-action. As reported here, with no shortage of spite by me, Die Fledermaus and American Maid will be replaced with very similar characters, Batmanuel and American Woman.

Except now, American Woman has undergone yet another name change. Maybe they couldn't get rights to the song. Or maybe they saw Heather Graham touching her goodies while Lenny Kravitz played the song.

Where was I?

Now the character is Captain Liberty. Even more generic. Fun!

Edlund said the show will be closer in tone to the original comic book, which is something you never ever hear.

"This is only a pilot, and awaits Fox's final judgment before it can go to series," he added. "Maybe our warped fruit will tumble out of your TV screens sometime in October. I hope it will, and I hope that you will decide to jump on the big Tick hay ride to Happyland. That would certainly help me pay my mortgage."

The show, Edlund says, will paint "a superheroic portrait of genuine human lameness."

Awesome.