Alien, Napoleon, and Gladiator director Ridley Scott is working on multiple original graphic novels

Ridley Scott, the director of Alien, Blade Runner, Gladiator, and countless other all-time movie classics, is moving into the graphic novel arena for the first time. He will be teaming up with the newly-formed comics division of Mechanical Cake for three planned launches on which he “will lend his meticulous eye and unmatched world-building skills to the projects,” according to a statement released to the press.

The first of these will be Modville, described as a “sci-fi/southern gothic crime drama” featuring AI humans known as “mods”. We’re told that eight books of Modville will be forthcoming, drawn by Hendry Prasetya and Eko Puteh, with a release date for the first volume set for March 2025.

That will be followed by Hyde, a riff on Robert Louis Stevenson’s classic tale with the monstrous Mr. Hyde now lurking beneath the streets of London; and Nick, described slightly cryptically as a “foundational Yule war story, steeped within the arcane Norse legends.” No dates or creative teams have been publicly announced for those two as yet. 

“Mechanical Cake is a terrific company,” said Ridley Scott in a statement about the new venture. “They understand the art of graphic novels. As an artist and painter, these projects are exciting to me, and I look forward to collaborating with Jesse, Tom, Dave, and the Mechanical Cake team.”