A Little-Known Fantasy Comic Might Become The Next Big Netflix Hit
“Cursed, of all things, to be good.”
An adaptation can take even the most obscure comic and catapult it to mainstream pop culture. The Walking Dead, The Boys, and Wynonna Earp are all great examples of this, but there are plenty you may not have even known were based on comics, like Ryan Murphy’s gonzo Hulu miniseries The Beauty or M. Night Shyamalan’s Old.
Netflix, especially, adapts little-known comics all the time, bringing them to a brand new medium and a brand new audience. The Umbrella Academy, Heartstopper, and Sandman may all be massively popular Netflix series, but first they were just comics. Now, the streamer is bringing another little-known comic to life, a fantasy epic with an oddly wholesome twist.
Owen and his talking axe are forced to only do good after being cursed by witches.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, Netflix has greenlit Barbaric, a series based on the Vault Comics comic of the same name. The comic follows Owen, a barbarian who was living a hedonistic, violent life until he was cursed by three witches who offered him a choice: be damned to hell forever, or live on but only with the ability to do what is morally correct. Armed with his trusty talking axe (that also serves as his confidant and conscience), he is forced to go out in the world on a quest to do good, much to his own chagrin. The comic started in 2021, and has released new issues ever since, usually collected in three-issue arcs.
Netflix is packing the TV adaptation of Barbaric with veterans in the field. The series will be co-showrun by Academy Award nominee Sheldon Turner and Supergirl TV series writer Robert Rovner. We also know that epic action movie legend Michael Bay will serve as director, which is reason enough to get excited.
Sam Claflin will star in Netflix’s Barbaric, presumedly as its main character, Owen.
We also know who will be the face of this series: Sam Claflin is already attached to star, so it’s safe to assume he’ll play Owen. British national treasure and Star Trek’s own Patrick Stewart is also involved, though it certainly sounds like his involvement will be restricted to voicing Owen’s axe — who better than Captain Jean-Luc Picard himself to be the moral voice of a high fantasy world?
Netflix may be the go-to home for weird comic adaptations, but all of its best-known ones are ending: The Umbrella Academy and The Sandman are both done, and Heartstopper and The Witcher are both ending with their next releases. That leaves the field wide open for a new comic adaptation to become a fan sensation, and this project has all the ingredients to be the next big thing. After all, it has to be good — making a successful show is the morally right thing to do to the audience.
