Jessica Chastain Is ‘Painkiller Jane’ for the Graphic Novel Adaptation
With the success of Disney and Marvel’s Avengers films and Warner Bros.’ recent Justice League endeavors, more studios are looking to get into the superhero game. As Marvel and DC are pretty much monopolized, production companies have to dig a little deeper into the comics universe to find new material. As it turns out, Jessica Chastain and her production company have landed on Painkiller Jane, the indestructible character from Event Comics.
According to Deadline, Chastain will produce and star in the film adaptation. Painkiller Jane’s main thing is that her wounds heal almost immediately after she gets hurt, but she still feels the pain of them before they disappear. In this way, she’s indestructible, but it’s a little different from a Wolverine kind of indestructible. In the comics, she starts off as an undercover cop who is mysteriously brought back to life after being caught in some sort of destructive event, like being blown up or pushed out of a tall window. She has a couple differing origin stories, and we don’t know yet which Chastain will pick for the movie. One of the producers behind Sin City: A Dame to Kill For is backing the film, and one of the creators of the comics, Jimmy Palmiotti, will also executive produce.
This isn’t actually the first time Jane has been brought to the screen. Back in 2007, a short-lived TV series on Syfy (back then still known as the SciFi Channel, those were the days) based on the comic book character aired for just one season, and before that she appeared in a made-for-TV movie on the same channel in 2005. These iteration of Painkiller Jane eschewed the bikini tops and weird bandages of the comics for a more street clothes look, but didn’t do much to bring Jane into the public eye, and unless you were still an avid reader of the comics, she was largely forgotten after that. With a star like Chastain, that’s all about to change.