MY VERSION OF THE PHANTOM, the ghost who walks, an introduction

For me , no character of fiction is locked into one way, imagination gives any artist the chance to find a way to change any character, because your imagination allows you to make yur own version of any character. Will your version be financially successful... I don't know, financial success in the arts is not an exact science. When Toulouse LAutrec made money with his art when alive but more came later in appreciation. Jean Michel Basquiat made money but died giving his art away for free , now decades later art he gave away for free near the time of this death that the art market suggested had little to no financial value is now worth millions each. Fragonard was very successful with his adult themed paintings when alive but after his death was cast out only until late 1900s and beyond gave his work more appreciation. so... the ability to regale isn't set ins tone, it isn't a matter of work rate, audiences, viewers, customers, the public have the right to simply not like your work today and love it tomorrow or love your work today or hate it tomorrow.

But I do think artistic objectives can be achieved in manipulating any story to a particular theme or style.

STeven Barnes made a post about John Carter of Mars by Disney and made the following comments , the first the initial reply and the others temporally in sequence to replies to mine.

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the shadow/the phantom/john carter / tintin I think a long list of films exist that aren't bad but the film going customer needed a preview. Marvel + DC + harry potter+ Twilight + Dune+Lord of the rings all had tv shows or comics or multiple media forms not movies in theaters that prepared the movie theater going audience for the films, which is needed when a ticket isnt affordable. If ticket prices were affordable I think all of those film would had better fiscal reception. .. My biggest issue was in preproduction the storyboard artists or writers didn't realize

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Kathy Lehman haha well the original radio program was cheesy, but sincere and the movie is sincere too.

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Steven Barnes That is cool you figure a way for tarzan today, i see a way to do phantom or shadow today. Though to your original post theme, i do think all three need marketing care, wise production . Need quality direction from an efficient director . it isn't just a good screenplay from you or me:) that will do it. None of these properties are like a star wars or marvel where they are present and strong in media before a movie comes out.

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Steven Barnes to the phantom, the inherited hero aspect of the phantom is the tool to break out of the negative biases, white saviordom, in its creation and majority history. Yes , the phantom was made with pure white savior mythos, but within the story it has a great way to fit beyond said limitation and not sideline the history of the character.

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Steven Barnes yes the cultural point of the original creator of the phantom , lee falk, or the audience he created for, would vanish with my version, but that is why it would be my work. Rich Murray's phantom, based on falk, but not falk's

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Steven Barnes I will answer the questions in reverse order. MY experience as an artist has taught me never to assume to know how to capture audiences for sure. But I always hope to capture them. 🙂 My Phantom's change is simple but influences the entire storyline. My change is to make the phantom older than kit walker. In Falk's version the phantom starts with Kit Walker. this lineage of white men of europe who save colored folk and others. In my version the phantom is from an ancient lineage from Africa itself, started by a Black man in the ancient predecessor to Bengali about the indian ocean coast somewhere[thus afro asiatic] . Now what has to be added because of this? The first phantom around the time of kemet passed it down to his first son, but also had other children. And over the thousands of years, the bloodline of the original phantom is now global , and has members of every phenotypical race in all parts of the world, but all in the bloodline don't know it. A group of descendents were started by the second son of the first phantom from kemet to catalog and keep the record of the lineage of the phantom and manage the phantom, including killing the phantom if need be. To kit walker, a phantom died without an heir sometime before pirates killed his father and he crashlanded on the shores of bengali A member of the second son's descendents notices kit and checking the records see's that he is a descendent of the first phantom. After Kit, who is negatively biased towards blacks makes the vow. The descendent of the second son invites him to become the phantom. What is the point? the phantom has always been a hero, the ghost who walks, but has not always been culturally the same. In my version, the phantom before kit walker was a black man who had a huge negative bias to whites. But still aided white people at times in a condensending way. Kit walker , albet condescending to blacks still saves lives including black people. To your first question, my phantom is still a legacy hero like falk's but unlike falk's my phantom is a greater legacy as complicated or complex in membership as humanity itself, while it has a more interesting stewardship in the descendents of the second son of the first phantom, preserving this hero, who can't stop all crimes or keep all safe, and has never tried to stop all crimes or keep all safe, but consistently does good no matter who bears the name.

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