Recently, it was announced by comics publisher Dynamite Entertainment that independent film company Mike the Pike Productions had optioned the film, television, and streaming rights to Vampirella, the queen of the comic book bad girls who celebrated her 50th anniversary two years ago. Although Mike the Pike has only one film in their production history—the 2018 low-budget sci-fi actioner Beyond White Space—they have great hopes of adapting Vampi’s story to the big (or little) screen.
This actually makes the third time that Vampirella’s caught the eye of Hollywood—and you can learn all about those earlier attempts in one of our most popular titles!
From the Stars…a Vampiress: An Unauthorized Guide to Vampirella’s Classic Horror Adventures, by Steven A. Roman (that’s me!), is the critically acclaimed nonfiction history of Vampirella that takes an extensive look at her early days, from the debut of her series in 1969 to the death of Warren Publishing in 1983. In it you’ll find an in-depth guide to all her Warren stories; a checklist of all her Warren appearances (plus the publications from Harris Comics and Dynamite Entertainment that reprinted her Warren adventures); an overview of the six novelizations by pulp sci-fi author Ron Goulart that were published in the 1970s by Warner Books; and the behind-the-scenes story of Warren Publishing’s demise, explaining how Vampirella survived the death of her original comic house. There’s also a foreword by Official Vampirella Historian Sean Fernald, a frontispiece by Warren artist Bob Larkin, and photographs from the personal archives of Forrest J Ackerman.
In addition to all that, I tell the tale of the unproduced film adaptation of the 1970s planned by legendary horror studio Hammer Films that was to star Barbara Leigh as Vampi and Peter Cushing (Grand Moff Tarkin of Star Wars) as her constant companion, the stage magician Pendragon. How the production came to be and how it ultimately fell apart is a complicated, somewhat convoluted story, but I did my best to put the events surrounding it into a chronological, logical order—for the first time ever! This overview includes a peek at Mr. Cushing’s personal copy of the ’70s Vampirella screenplay.
I also take a look at the awful 1996 direct-to-cable-TV movie that was made for the Showtime network, produced by Roger Corman, directed by Jim Wynorski (Dinocroc vs. SuperGator), scripted by Gary Gerani (Pumpkinhead), and starring Talisa Soto (Mortal Kombat) as Vampi and The Who’s front man, rock god Roger Daltrey as…Dracula! It’s a film so bad and so low budget, and the Vampirella costume that was concocted was such an eyesore, that even Wynorski hates being reminded of his involvement with it.
So really, when you look at it from that perspective, anything Mike the Pike Productions comes up with could potentially only be an improvement. Unless, of course, they decide to ditch Vampirella’s iconic swimsuit-and-go-go-boots look to make her look more socially acceptable; then the movie will be straight-up trash. After all, as both former Vampi comic writer Nancy A. Collins and current Vampi writer Christopher Priest have stated in interviews, take away that costume and the character is no longer Vampirella, but just another run-of-the-mill vampire. Good luck, then, Mike the Pike—we Vampi fans are hoping for the best.
From the Stars…a Vampiress: An Unauthorized Guide to Vampirella’s Classic Horror Adventures is available in both print and digital formats, so visit its product page for ordering information.
