Adi Shankar | |
---|---|
Born | Aditya Shankar 8 January 1985 |
Nationality | American |
Occupation | Filmmaker |
Years active | 2010–present |
Aditya Shankar (born January 8, 1985) is an Indian-American film producer, screenwriter, film director, television program creator, television showrunner, and occasional actor.
In the 2010’s he was best known for Dredd , Castlevania and his "Bootleg Universe" One-Shot series of fan films. In the 2020s, he reinvented himself as a TV series auteur with critically acclaimed Netflix series such as The Guardians of Justice, Captain Laserhawk: A Blood Dragon Remix, and the upcoming Devil May Cry.
He remains the youngest producer to have a number one film at the North American box office with the 2012 film The Grey . [2] In 2014, Shankar ranked number 20 on GQ magazine's list of "Most Influential Global Indian Men". [3] He co-founded the production company 1984 Private Defense Contractors. [4]
Aditya Shankar was born in Kolkata, West Bengal, India, to a banking executive and an educator. [5] His family spent his formative years relocating among Chennai, Mumbai, Hong Kong, and Singapore. [6] He immigrated to Rhode Island, USA by himself at the age of 16 two days before 9/11. Shankar studied communications, business, and theater at Northwestern University and graduated in June 2007. [7]
His Bootleg satires include The Punisher: Dirty Laundry , [8] [9] Venom: Truth in Journalism, and Power/Rangers . [10]
In 2015, Shanker signed a three-picture deal with Disney's Maker Studios. [11]
For his controversial "Bootleg Universe" Shankar cites British street artist Banksy as a major influence. [12] In addition, Shankar frequently cites rapper Eminem, writer Warren Ellis, artist Takashi Murakami, wrestler Diamond Dallas Page and Final Fantasy VII character Sephiroth as artistic and stylistic influences. [13]
In April 2018, Shankar started a script contest which he hoped would encourage people to rewrite The Simpsons character Apu Nahasapeemapetilon "that takes the character of Apu and in a clever way subverts him, pivots him, intelligently writes him out, or evolves him". [14] He stated that, in the event that the show's producers will not take on the winning script, he would produce and distribute the episode as part of his "Bootleg Universe" fan films. [15]
On October 26, 2018, Shankar leaked during an interview with IndieWire that Apu was going to be written out of the show, stating that he got the information from two people who work for The Simpsons and a third source who works directly with creator Matt Groening. [15] A representative for the show at Fox responded, saying, "Apu appeared in the 10/14/18 episode "My Way or the Highway to Heaven"." [15] In the episode, Apu makes an appearance as one of dozens of characters gathered around God in Heaven. On October 28, Simpsons executive producer and show runner Al Jean responded on Twitter by saying: "Adi Shankar is not a producer on the Simpsons. I wish him the best but he does not speak for our show." [16]
The character was absent from the show for two years, and on Jan 17, 2020, Hank Azaria announced he was stepping down from the role of Apu permanently. Shankar has stated that he was against the cancellation of the character: "Silencing Apu is a step sideways. It doesn't undo the damage, address the damage or benefit the show's 'creativity.' It just removes another brown face from TV." [17]
Year | Title | Role | Studio/Distributor | Notes |
---|---|---|---|---|
2010 | Main Street | Executive Producer | Magnolia Pictures | |
2011 | Machine Gun Preacher | Relativity Media | ||
The Grey | Open Road | |||
2012 | Dredd | Lionsgate | ||
Killing Them Softly | The Weinstein Company | |||
Gangs of Wasseypur | Cinelicious Pics | Shankar also Presented the international release. | ||
2013 | Broken City | 20th Century Studios | ||
Lone Survivor | Universal Pictures | |||
2014 | The Voices | Producer | Lionsgate | |
A Walk Among the Tombstones | Executive Producer | Universal Pictures | ||
2017 | Bodied | Producer | Neon | |
2024 | Ick | Producer | [TBD] |
Year | Title | Role | Distributor | Notes |
---|---|---|---|---|
2017–2021 | Castlevania | Showrunner Executive producer | Netflix | Ended After 4 Seasons |
2022 | The Guardians of Justice | Creator Co-Director Executive producer Showrunner Co-Writer | Limited Series | |
2023 | Castlevania: Nocturne | Executive Producer | ||
2023 | Captain Laserhawk: A Blood Dragon Remix [18] | Creator Showrunner Executive producer Voice actor Story Writer | ||
2025 | Devil May Cry [19] | Creator Showrunner Executive producer Story Writer | ||
TBA | Assassin's Creed [20] | Executive producer | ||
TBA | Hyper Light Drifter [21] | Executive producer | TBA | |
TBA | PUBG [22] | Creator Showrunner Executive producer |
Year | Title | Length | Genre | Notes |
---|---|---|---|---|
2012 | The Punisher: Dirty Laundry | 9 min 50 seconds | Action/Crime | Thomas Jane reprises his role as Marvel anti-hero Frank Castle aka the Punisher from the 2004 film. |
2013 | Venom: Truth in Journalism | 17 min 8 seconds | Crime/Comedy | In a black and white homage to cult Belgian black comedy Man Bites Dog and set in the late 1980s, Ryan Kwanten stars as Spider-Man's nemesis Eddie Brock / Venom as he is followed around by a documentary film crew. In a post-credits sequence, Shankar portrays rival documentary video director Sunil Bakshi, who is similarly following around the assassin Ben / Bullseye and filming him execute people. |
2014 | Judge Dredd: Superfiend | 26 min 32 seconds | Action/Comedy | An animated re-interpretation of Judge Dredd in the form of a violent Saturday morning cartoon. Does not take place in the continuity of the Shankar produced 2012 Judge Dredd film Dredd . |
2015 | Power/Rangers | 11 min 45 seconds | Action/Sci-Fi | A dark reimagining of the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers that explores a timeline where the Rangers lost, starring James Van Der Beek and Katee Sackhoff, with Carla Perez reprising her role as Rita Repulsa from various Power Rangers series from 1994 to 1998. |
James Bond: In Service of Nothing | 10 min 55 seconds | Spy/Action | An animated short film in the style of a film animatic, where after 30 years in the agency, James Bond is no longer required for his services leading to his retirement as he tries adjust himself to a new life in the present. | |
2018 | Mr. Rogers: A War Hero | 14 min 06 seconds | Biopic | A "What if?" scenario based on the longstanding rumor where Fred Rogers served in the Vietnam War and based several characters on Mister Rogers' Neighborhood from his wartime comrades |
2019 | The End of Pokemon | 5 min 25 seconds | Action/Thriller | An animated fake trailer for a dark epilogue to the Pokémon anime series. |
Apu Nahasapeemapetilon is a recurring character in the American animated television series The Simpsons. He is an Indian immigrant proprietor who runs the Kwik-E-Mart, a popular convenience store in Springfield, and is known for his catchphrase, "Thank you, come again". He is voiced by Hank Azaria and first appeared in the episode "The Telltale Head". He was named in honor of the title character of The Apu Trilogy by Satyajit Ray.
Warren Girard Ellis is an English comic book writer, novelist, and screenwriter. He is best known as the co-creator of several original comics series, including Transmetropolitan (1997–2002), Global Frequency (2002–2004) and Red (2003–2004), which was adapted into the feature films Red (2010) and Red 2 (2013). Ellis is the author of the novels Crooked Little Vein (2007) and Gun Machine (2013) and the novella Normal (2016).
Adrian Fahrenheit Țepeș, better known as Alucard, is a character in Konami's Castlevania series of video games. His first appearance in the series was in the 1989 game Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse, but he is best known for his role in the critically acclaimed Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, released in 1997. His design in Symphony of the Night was created by Ayami Kojima, marking her first contribution to the Castlevania franchise.
Vlad Țepeș Dracula or simply known as Dracula, real name Mathias Cronqvist, is a fictional character from the Castlevania video game series created by Konami. A vampire and a sorcerer, he is the main antagonist of the series, the archenemy of the Belmont clan, and the final boss of almost every installment. In the series reboot Castlevania: Lords of Shadow, Dracula is reimagined as an 11th-century holy knight named Gabriel Belmont and serves as the central character of the game and its two sequels. The Lords of Shadow series tells the story of Gabriel's quest to save the world, vampirism and redemption.
Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse is a 1989 action-platform game developed and published by Konami for the Nintendo Entertainment System. It was released in Japan in 1989, and in North America in 1990, and in Europe by Palcom in 1992. It was later released on the Virtual Console for the Wii, Nintendo 3DS, and Wii U.
Far Cry is a 2008 English-language German action film loosely adapted from the video game of the same name. The film is directed by Uwe Boll and stars Til Schweiger. It was a major box-office bomb and received negative reviews.
Anime-influenced animation is a type of non-Japanese work of animation that is noticeably similar to or inspired by anime. Generally, the term anime refers to a style of animation originating from Japan. As Japanese anime became increasingly popular, Western animation studios began implementing some visual stylizations typical in anime—such as exaggerated facial expressions, "super deformed" versions of characters, and white radical lines appearing on the screen when something shocking happens or when someone screams, etc.
Devil May Cry is an urban fantasy action-adventure game franchise created by Hideki Kamiya. It is primarily developed and published by Capcom. The series centers on the demon hunter Dante and his efforts to thwart various demon invasions of Earth. Its gameplay consists of combat scenarios in which the player must attempt to extend long chains of attacks, avoiding damage and exhibiting stylized combat by varying their attacks; this combat, along with time and the number of items collected and used, are considered in grading the player's performance.
Millarworld Limited is an imprint of comic books published by Scottish comic book writer Mark Millar as a creator-owned line, featuring characters created by him in a shared fictional universe, the Millarworld. These characters include Wesley Gibson, Kick-Ass, Hit-Girl, Eggsy Unwin, Nemesis, Duke McQueen, Edison Crane, and others, while the events of The Unfunnies, Jupiter's Legacy, and Supercrooks exist as popular fiction within the world of the Millarworld. The imprint was launched in 2003 with the publication of the miniseries Wanted, followed by Kick-Ass – The Dave Lizewski Years, Kingsman, War Heroes, and The Magic Order, and later the crossover series Big Game. While the majority of series in the line are written by Millar himself, the series Kingsman, Kick-Ass – The New Girl and Hit-Girl feature new writers from their second volumes onward, after Millar wrote the series' first volumes.
Powerhouse Animation Studios, Inc. is an American animation studio based in Austin, Texas. It was founded in April 2001 with a subsidiary called Powerhouse Animation LLC, established in the summer of 2014. The company develops and produces traditional 2D animation, motion comics, motion graphics, art assets, digital paint, illustration for television series, motion pictures, video game cinemas, commercials, advertising campaigns, educational properties, and entertainment companies.
Ubisoft Film & Television is a French-American film and television production company and a subsidiary of video game publisher Ubisoft based in Montreuil and Los Angeles. The company was founded on 2011, and is in charge of producing films and television shows based on Ubisoft franchises and inspired by Ubisoft's worlds and gaming culture.
Castlevania is an American adult animated dark fantasy action television series created and written by Warren Ellis for Netflix, and is produced by Frederator Studios's Kevin Kolde and Fred Seibert and Shankar Animation's Adi Shankar. Based on the Japanese video game series of the same name by Konami, the first two seasons adapt the 1989 entry Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse and follow Trevor Belmont, Alucard and Sypha Belnades as they defend the nation of Wallachia from Dracula and his minions. Additionally, characters and elements from the 2005 entry Castlevania: Curse of Darkness are featured beginning in the second season, and Alucard's backstory is drawn from the 1997 entry Castlevania: Symphony of the Night. The art style is heavily influenced by Japanese animation and Ayami Kojima's artwork.
This is a list of events in animation in 2018.
The Problem with Apu is a 2017 American documentary film written by and starring comedian Hari Kondabolu and produced and directed by Michael Melamedoff. It focuses on the character Apu Nahasapeemapetilon, an Indian immigrant in the animated sitcom The Simpsons who, for a period, was the only figure of Indian heritage to appear regularly on mainstream U.S. television. The film explores encounters with negative stereotypes, minstrelsy, racial microaggressions, and slurs against people of Indian and South Asian heritage.
Adi Shankar's Bootleg Universe Media Group is a media company founded in 2012 by Indian-American producer & television show creator Adi Shankar.
Enter the Anime is a 2019 American–Japanese documentary film. It features Tania Nolan trying to explain the popularity of anime by interviewing Shinji Aramaki, Kôzô Morishita and Yoko Takahashi, the creators behind well-known productions like Castlevania, Aggretsuko and Kengan Ashura. The documentary was released by Netflix on August 5, 2019.
Devil May Cry, also known as Adi Shankar's Devil May Cry, is an upcoming adult animated urban fantasy action television series created by Adi Shankar and based on the Japanese video game franchise of the same name by Capcom. Produced by Studio Mir in South Korea, the series is scheduled for an April 2025 release on Netflix.
The Guardians of Justice is a live-action/adult animated mixed media superhero television series created, directed, written, and executive produced by Adi Shankar. The series is a Bootleg Universe production and a satire of DC Comics and the Justice League starring WWE Hall of Famer Diamond Dallas Page as Knight Hawk, a parody of an older grizzled Batman. The series was released on Netflix on March 1, 2022.
Captain Laserhawk: A Blood Dragon Remix is a French–American adult animated television series produced by Ubisoft Film & Television, Bobbypills, and Bootleg Universe. It is inspired by the 2013 video game Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon, while amalgamating elements and characters from several other Ubisoft franchises. Created by Adi Shankar, the series was released on October 19, 2023 on Netflix and received generally positive reviews from critics.