Goyer, David S. 1966-

views updated

GOYER, David S. 1966-

PERSONAL:

Born 1966.. Education: University of Southern California Film School, B.A., 1988.

ADDRESSES:

Office—c/o Author Mail, D.C. Comics, 1700 Broadway, Seventh floor, New York, NY 10019-5905. Agent—Phil Raskind, Endeavor, 9701 Wilshire Blvd., Tenth floor, Beverly Hills, CA 90212.

CAREER:

Comics writer, novelist, short story writer, screenwriter, producer, and television series creator.

WRITINGS:

COMICS

(With James Robinson) Justice Be Done: JSA, D.C. Comics (New York, NY), 2000.

(With Geoff Johns) A Burning Hate, D.C. Comics (New York, NY), 2001.

(With others) JSA: Darkness Falls, D.C. Comics (New York, NY), 2002.

(With Geoff Johns) JLA, JSA: Virtue and Vice, D.C. Comics (New York, NY), 2002.

(With Geoff Johns) JSA: The Return of Hawkman,, D.C. Comics (New York, NY), 2002.

(With James Robinson) Starman: A Starry Knight, D.C. Comics (New York, NY), 2002.

(With James Robinson and Chuck Dixon) The Justice Society Returns!, D.C. Comics (New York, NY), 2003.

(With Leonard Kirk) JSA: Stealing Thunder, D.C. Comics (New York, NY), 2003.

SCREENPLAYS

Death Warrant, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer/United Artists, 1990.

(And associate producer) Kickboxer 2: The Road Back, Trimark, 1991.

Demonic Toys,, Paramount, 1992.

Arcade, Full Moon Entertainment, 1993.

(With Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio) Robert A. Heinlein's The Puppet Masters, Buena Vista, 1994.

The Crow: City of Angels, (also known as The Crow II), Miramax, 1996.

Blade, New Line Cinema, 1998.

Dark City, New Line Cinema, 1998.

(And coproducer) Mission to Mars, 2000.

(And executive producer) Blade 2, New Line Cinema, 2002.

(And director) ZigZag, Franchise Classics, 2002.

(And director and producer) Blade: Trinity, New Line Cinema, 2004.

TELEPLAYS

(And executive producer) Sleepwalkers,, National Broadcasting Company, Inc. (NBC), 1997.

Also author of television specials including Nick Fury: Agent of SHIELD, 1998; Origins of "Blade:" A Look at Dark Comics, 1998; La Magra, 1998; Blood Tide, 1998; Blood Pact: The Making of "Blade II," 2002; Night Bites: Women and Their Vampires, 2003. Author of "Dream of Doom" episode for Perversions of Science, Home Box Office (HBO), 1997. Writer and executive producer of the television series Fearsum (originally titled FreakyLinks).

NOVELS

(With Frank Lauria, Lem Dobbs, and Alex Proyas) Dark City, St. Martin's Press (New York, NY), 1998.

WORK IN PROGRESS:

Current projects expected in 2005 include Batman Begins and Ghost Rider.

SIDELIGHTS:

David S. Goyer is a prolific writer with projects that range from comic books to screenplays. Goyer is also well known for his work on the popular movie series "Blade." In an interview with Reg Seeton at the Ugo Web site, Goyer noted that his start as a screenplay writer was "fortunate"; his first manuscript was produced as the Jean-Claude Van Damme film "Death Warrant."

In this interview, Goyer also told Seeton that "Blade" was an interesting project because he was attempting to make a movie about what was originally a minor comic book character. "We didn't have the burden of a canon [that] we had to adhere to." Called an "edgy fantasy" by Variety reviewer Joe Leydon, "Blade" has been followed by two sequels: "Blade II" and "Blade: Trinity."

Dark City, produced in 1998, is another movie that Goyer is well known for. In the film, John Murdoch finds himself in a hotel room, with no memory of how he got there, only to learn that he is wanted under suspicion of multiple murders. At the same time, Murdoch is being chased by strange men who have the ability to alter reality at will. According to Todd McCarthy in a Variety review, the movie "trades in such weighty themes as memory, thought control, human will and the altering of reality, but is engaging mostly in the degree to which it creates and sustains a visually startling alternate universe."

Goyer's comic writing career began in 2000 when D.C. Comics published Justice Be Done: JSA. (JSA stands for Justice Society of America.) Goyer also reintroduced an old comic book character in JSA: The Return of Hawkman. Bill Radford of the Colorado Springs Gazette wrote, "The fact that it has taken nearly two years to bring back the winged warrior shows the challenge DC faced in reviving a character whose history had become a tangled nightmare." In 2003, after completing fifty-one issues, Goyer chose to take a hiatus from comic writing.

Goyer wrote and directed the 2002 film ZigZag, which explores the relationship between an autistic teen and his dying social worker. Hollywood Reporter's Frank Scheck commented that the film's "familiar material is enlivened by reasonably clever plot twists and strong performances." Joe Leyden in a Variety review found that "Goyer infuses heart and vigor into material that could have come off as overly familiar at best, sappily improbable at worst."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Gazette (Colorado Springs, CO), April 5, 2001, Bill Radford, "Hawkman to Make Long-Delayed Return."

Hollywood Reporter, June 21, 2002, Frank Scheck, review of ZigZag, p. 46; August 11, 2003, Chris Gardner, "Meditating," p. 55.

Library Journal, May 1, 2003, Steve Raiteri, review of JLA, JSA: Virtue and Vice, p. 96.

Publishers Weekly, April 28, 2003, review of JLA/JSA: Virtue and Vice, p. 51; January 26, 2004, review of The Justice Society Returns!, p. 233.

Variety, October 27, 1997, Tony Scott, review of Sleepwalkers, p. 32; February 23, 1998, Todd McCarthy, review of Dark City, p. 73; March 20, 2002, Joe Leydon, review of Blade II, p. 12; April 11, 2002, Joe Leydon, review of ZigZag, p. 12.