Part of the concept of Matt Wagners seminal Grendel comic books is the relatively short story of Hunter Rose, the genius teenaged fencing prodigy that becomes a peerless masked assassin named Grendel, and later a Keyser-Sozesque mastermind running half the organised crime in the United States. In a clever subversion of the usual superhero trope, Hunter Rose (which isnt his real name) masquerades as a playboy novelist in high society raising a young girl as his ward, and his nefarious night time activities are beset at every turn by his archenemy, a savage, bestial werewolf called Argent who works with the police to track down and end Grendels holy terror once and for all. Thats not all, though. Hunter Rose is only the first Grendel. Others taking on the mask after his death find themselves gradually subsumed by a spirit of violence and mayhem. As the years go on, Grendel nicknamed the Devil becomes a god-figure. There are whole future timelines with cults devoted to Grendel, their members called Devils, themselves the nemeses of clans of vampires that haunt bayou and city alike. Wagners career-defining epic tells stories spanning centuries, all linked by the malevolent influence of Grendel. Its part an inversion of the Batman story, part Terminator-style dystopian apocalypse (and at one point an unstoppable cyborg Devil makes an appearance, a clear nod to the aforementioned cinematic franchise). The joy of Grendel is that the concept is a jumping off point for story after story after story, set whenever and wherever you like. As a television series, the sky is the limit.
Professional writer, punk werewolf and nesting place for starfish. Obsessed with squid, spirals and story. I publish short weird fiction online at desincarne.com, and tweet nonsense under the name Jack The Bodiless. You can follow me all you like, just don't touch my stuff.