Though his big movie this weekend, Eagle Eye, is based on an original idea by none other than Steven Spielberg, D.J. Caruso is about to move into adaptation territory with Y: The Last Man. The 60-issue comic book series, which just wrapped up this year, is a post-apocalyptic tale about one man, Yorick, who is the only male survivor of a plague that kills everything on earth with a Y chromosome. The sprawling story tells what happens all over the world, from Amazonian tribes of women to the Washington Monument in D.C. Caruso talked to First Showing about his plans to adapt the comics.
First of all, Caruso admitted he's facing a huge challenge: "If you know the series at all, it's a lot to choose from… You want to make a movie that stands alone, but I keep telling them I can't fit it all into one movie. God willing if it's successful enough, there has to be another movie."
He then went into a lot of details that will likely only make sense to you if you've read the comics. Basically he'll show a lot of what's happening around the world, such as in China, in montages and little vignettes, but for the most part the movie will focus on Yorick and his monkey, Ampersand. There's also been a major plot change from the books, inserting a "ticking clock" with Yorick and Ampersand. Caruso explains, "I separated them, and Yorick starts to get a little sick when Ampersand's not with him. I felt like we needed some kind of ticking clock so it wasn't just a boy and his monkey."
Caruso says the book's writer, Brian K. Vaughn, was happy with the plot change, so purists can take heart that Caruso is going forward with best intentions. As someone who hasn't read the comics, I have no idea what this "ticking clock" addition could mean. So, nerds of the world (and I mean that in the best way), speak up. What will this change about your beloved Y?
