10 First Draft Movie Ideas Better Than What We Got
7. Hancock Is The Villain - Hancock
The Original Idea
Hancock started out as a spec script called Tonight, He Comes, written by Vincent Ngo in 1996 - and boy, it is wild.
The evidently R-rated material takes a far darker and more sinister approach to the "superhero" genre, fashioning John Hancock (Will Smith) as a tortured superhuman who ends up killing police officers and, uh, considers raping a woman.
Yeah, they were probably right to leave that last part out, actually.
Nevertheless, Hancock wears a cape reminiscent of Superman - more like Brightburn, really - and occasionally tries to be good, despite him clearly being the true villain of this story.
He ultimately crosses paths with the Longfellow family and attempts to steal the wife, Mary, away from her sad sack husband Horus. This leads to Hancock nearly forcing himself on Mary and slaughtering the aforementioned fleet of cops, ahead of a final battle with Horus.
After almost killing Horus and believing he's killed Mary, Hancock attempts in vain to kill himself, after which he finally vows to be a good guy.
It's undeniably rough around the edges, but it sure is a lot more interesting than what we ended up with.
What We Got
The released movie is a far broader stab at the spine of the original idea - yes, Hancock is a washed-up superhero who can't seem to do the right thing, but the character's edges are softened, making his redemption decidedly easier for the audience to get on-board with.
The tone bristles up against the edges of the PG-13 rating, but it's still PG-13, with the graphic violence and sexual content of the original script significantly downplayed.
Though Hancock does also become involved with a couple in the film, it takes an entirely different direction - Mary (Charlize Theron) is eventually revealed to be a superhero herself, while Horus is replaced with Ray (Jason Bateman), a PR specialist attempting to rehabilitate his image.
It's easy to understand why Peter Berg made the movie that he did, but it's a damn shame the world missed out on an unrestrained, R-rated rendition of this promising concept. Instead, the end result was generic, passably watchable blockbuster sludge.