After putting so much creative energy into crafting stories for The Shield and Sons of Anarchy, Kurt Sutter left the world of modern crime behind for the historical saga The Bastard Executioner, which didn’t last as long as it should have. Sutter is again going in a completely different direction with his next project, the supernatural comic book miniseries Lucas Stand, and if the end product is as good as it sounds, this immediately needs to get its own TV show.
According to Sutter, Lucas Stand centers on the man of the same name, a former special-ops soldier whose military career is decorated with deplorable and horrifying acts, all done for the good ol’ U.S. of A. His return to the public sector isn’t an easy one, and things get so bad that he wants to kill himself. But before that can happen, he’s contacted by someone who – here’s where it gets wild – wants Lucas to become a hired hitman tasked with hunting down and killing demons that have escaped from Hell, with every execution balancing one of his own mortal sins. It’s got no plans for live-action (yet), but this is already the best new show on FX. Or HBO. Or Netflix. Whoever reaches out first.
In writing Lucas Stand, Sutter is working with dark fantasy author Caitlin Kittredge, who also writes the Vertigo comic Coffin Hill, and the art will be tackled by Jesús Hervás of Clive Barker’s Hellraiser and other things. Unfortunately, the series is only getting six issues through BOOM! Studios , which could be one mark against it being spun for TV. But it’s not as if everything on the small screen was created with 10 seasons completely mapped out, and more stories can always be written for both a comic book and a TV show.
In any case, Kurt Sutter actually had it in mind as a TV show when he first came up with the concept, but he didn’t even make it through the script-writing process because he didn’t think it could be produced in that medium, according to Variety, due to the scope of the story and the practicality of adapting it for live-action. Now, it’s true that I don’t have any idea what Lucas Stand is really like, but we live in a world where The Man in the High Castle and Game of Thrones exist, with mother-flipping American Gods coming to Starz later this year. If those epic-in-scale works (among others) can be turned into TV shows, then I have confidence Sutter can figure out the logistics of bringing this demon-slaying tale to television in a feasible way. Unless he just doesn’t want to. That, I can’t do anything about. Just like everything else in Sutter’s life.
With The Bastard Executioner now a thing of the past, Kurt Sutter’s future will eventually see him setting viewers up with a Sons of Anarchy spinoff centered on the Mayans, as well as a Sons prequel based on the First 9, who started SAMCRO. But he’ll only be executive producing the former, and he wanted to get the latter going when enough years had passed after S.O.A.’s finale. Lucas Stand will obviously take up some of his time in the coming months, but I know I’m not alone in thinking he needs another big TV project in the near future. And a hitman using big guns to hunt demons needs to be in that project.
