Stories by @michaelcosby

Josh Trank's Shadow of the Colossus

A young slave named Wander flees his brutal life and falls in love with Mono, a cursed girl blamed for her mother's death. When her drunken father accidentally kills her, Wander steals an ancient sword and rides to the Forbidden Land. There, the disembodied spirit Dormin offers to revive Mono—if Wander slays sixteen giant colossi guarding the land. As Wander kills each magnificent creature, dark tendrils pierce his body, slowly transforming him. Lord Emon and his warriors hunt him, but Wander persists. After his horse Agro sacrifices himself to save Wander, Wander defeats the final colossus—only to discover Dormin has used him to resurrect its own monstrous form. Wander fights for control, sacrifices himself to stop Dormin, and is reincarnated as a baby in a secret garden where Mono and the surviving Agro find him.

Neil Marshall's Black Widow

In 1983 Soviet Kazakhstan, a woman drops her baby from a burning building into the arms of a stranger. That child, Natasha, is raised in the Red Room—a brutal spy program that surgically enhances her into the perfect assassin, the Black Widow. After a massacre forces her to flee, she hides in New York as a gardener and poker player. But her past follows her when a Russian operative kills her roommate. Forced back to Kazakhstan, Natasha reunites with her broken foster father, leads an army of child escapees, and destroys the Red Room in a nuclear firestorm—finally earning her freedom.

Jonathan Hensleigh's The Punisher 2: War Zone

After his wife and son were murdered, former FBI agent Frank Castle became the Punisher—a vigilante who kills wanted felons the system won’t stop. When Castle massacres 30 mafia capos in Queens, FBI agent Stevie West makes him her obsession. But her hunt is interrupted by Billy Russo, a handsome young gangster who seizes the power vacuum left by the dead dons. Castle and Russo collide in a bloodbath that leaves Russo’s face horrifically disfigured. Transformed into the monster “Jigsaw,” Russo murders Stevie’s father. Now Stevie understands Castle’s war—and must decide whether to arrest him or let him finish what the law cannot.

Steven S. DeKnight's God of War

A Spartan warrior named Kratos, lost to bloodlust and ambition, prays to the God of War Ares to save his army from certain defeat. Ares grants him the magical Blades of Chaos but demands Kratos serve him forever. Kratos accepts, then savagely conquers all in his path—until Ares tricks him into slaughtering his own wife and daughter. Cursed to wear their ashes on his skin, the ghost-white Kratos swears vengeance against Ares. Guided by the goddess Athena, Kratos battles monsters, gods, and titans to find the legendary Pandora’s Box—the only weapon that can kill an immortal. After enduring the depths of Hades, Kratos finally confronts Ares in a colossal battle, destroying the god who made him and seizing his own terrible destiny.

Castle Wolfenstein

In 1933 Nazi Germany, young William Blazkowicz watches as his father, a gentle chemist, is arrested by the Gestapo. Eleven years later, now a U.S. Army Ranger Captain, "BJ" is recruited for a secret mission behind enemy lines. Parachuting into Bavaria, he teams with British agent "Agent One" and the German resistance to infiltrate Castle Wolfenstein. Their objective: assassinate Adolf Hitler. Inside the castle, they discover a nightmare of Nazi science—cloned Hitlers, a zombie army, a robotic war machine called the ÜberSoldat, and a doomsday rocket aimed at London. BJ must rescue his long-lost father, stop the weapon, and survive the night.

David Hayter's Iron Man

Billionaire inventor Tony Stark's dream of privatized spaceflight ends in near-fatal disaster, but the real wreckage is his family. When his technology surfaces in a North Korean massacre, Tony discovers his estranged father Howard—a cold-blooded industrial titan—has spent years stealing his patents to build an unstoppable weapons empire. Framed for his own attempted murder and fitted with an experimental chest plate keeping his shattered heart beating, Tony forges a suit of armor with loyal friend Rhodey and agent Bethany Cabe. As Howard and fanatical lieutenant Justin Hammer orchestrate a presidential assassination to install a puppet and conquer the globe, Tony must become Iron Man—not to save the world, but to end his father's war.

The Safdie Brothers' 48 Hrs.

A hardened San Francisco cop, Jack Cates, springs a slick convict, Reggie Hammond, from prison for 48 hours to hunt the ruthless killer who stole Cates' gun and murdered two fellow officers. Handcuffed together through a neon-drenched underworld of dive bars, hostile clubs, and violent hideouts, the two men clash over race, power, and survival as they track the unhinged Albert Ganz and his loyal but tragic enforcer, Billy Bear. As the body count rises and the clock ticks down, Cates and Hammond forge a grudging, combative partnership that forces each to confront the broken systems that made them—culminating in a desperate showdown where the line between cop and convict blurs beyond recognition.

Steven Spielberg's The Executioners

When Max Cady, a feral ex-con, is released from a fourteen-year prison sentence, he tracks down Sam Bowden—the idealistic public defender who failed to keep him out of jail. Rather than attack Sam directly, Cady wages a campaign of psychological terror against his family: poisoning their dog, brutalizing Sam's colleague, and approaching his sixteen-year-old daughter under the guise of her summer school teacher. As the local police prove powerless and a hired private detective is murdered, Sam discovers that the legal system he's devoted his life to cannot protect what he loves. Forced to abandon every principle he's built his identity around, he takes his wife and daughter to a houseboat on the Cape Fear River, where the family must confront Cady alone—and discover what each of them is capable of when everything is at stake.

Sam Raimi's The Amazing Spider-Man

Peter Parker's world is crumbling: Mary Jane has left him, and the winged Vulture transforms a tired worker into the living lightning bolt Electro during a heist. As Spider-Man battles these threats, he finds an unlikely ally in the seductive Black Cat, secretly his new editor Felicia Hardy, whose betrayal reveals a deeper conspiracy. Meanwhile, Dr. Curt Connors' desperate experiments turn him into the Lizard, forcing Peter to confront a mentor become monster. With Aunt May's life in the balance and a new menace discovering the Goblin's abandoned lair, Peter must choose whether the mask is a burden or a duty—before the city pays the price.

David S. Goyer's Venom

Disgraced tabloid reporter Eddy Brock's life is a wreck—fired, broke, and haunted by childhood trauma at the hands of serial killer Cletus Kasady. During Kasady's televised execution, an alien symbiote crash-lands and bonds with Eddy, transforming him into Venom, a shapeshifting, fanged antihero. Meanwhile, a second, more vicious symbiote merges with Kasady, creating Carnage, who escapes death row and plunges the city into blackout-fueled chaos. With psychiatrist Dr. Rachel Kafka caught between them, Eddy must master the monster within and face his childhood tormentor in a brutal symbiote showdown at the burned-out asylum where their nightmare began—forcing him to choose between the power of Venom and his own humanity.

Dungeons & Dragons: The Hand of Chaos

A disgraced rogue, Raven Hightower, and his cursed Dragonborn partner, Hack Karroway, discover a treasure map leading to the legendary Eye of Vecna. Desperate for a final, life-changing score, they assemble a team of misfits, including a treacherous gnome named Trickfoot. Their quest takes them from the slums of Greyhawk to a secret Cuthbertine monastery and a dragon's acid-filled lair, all while being hunted by a fanatical death cult led by Hightower's former enslaver, the Drow prince Razer Vandree. In a brutal betrayal, Trickfoot reveals himself as Vecna reborn, steals the Eye, and murders their friend. Now burdened with the sentient Sword of Kas, Hightower must embrace an impossible destiny, confront the demons of his past, and stop the lich-god from reclaiming his Hand and enslaving the world.

Robert Rodriguez's The Jetsons

In 2307, harried family man George Jetson loses his job at Spacely Industries to a soulless robot and, in a desperate bid to prove his worth, accidentally steals and sells his frustrated wife Jane's secret invention. As Jane rockets to corporate stardom at a rival company, George must navigate a chaotic domestic battlefield of malfunctioning appliances, teenage rebellion, and a pelvic-shattering cheerleading revelation. The spousal rivalry culminates at a galactic gadget expo, where the family must unite to outwit two feuding industrial titans before a vengeful boss and a stolen idea tear their sky-high home apart forever.

Len Wiseman's Gears of War

The humans of Sera, after decades of war over the fuel Imulsion, face annihilation on Emergence Day when the Locust Horde—a savage subterranean army—erupts from below. Sergeant Marcus Fenix, a scarred and grim soldier, fights alongside his best friend Dom Santiago to defend humanity's last stronghold, Jacinto. As Dom is shattered by the loss of his family, Marcus must confront his estranged father, Adam Fenix, the genius whose past work may hold the key to a devastating counterattack. With the elite Delta Squad at his side, Marcus descends into the Hollow to retrieve a weapon that can turn the tide, leading to a desperate final stand where humanity's survival hinges on a son's forgiveness and a father's ultimate sacrifice.

Portrait of a Lady

James Bond races to uncover a shadowy organisation that threatens global catastrophe through high-tech sabotage, leaving a trail of chaos from Scotland to Tokyo. With few leads, Bond must infiltrate a world of industrial espionage, killer robots, and cutting-edge technology. His mission becomes a deadly game of cat-and-mouse across Hong Kong, where he confronts a brilliant and ruthless British-Chinese industrialist with a devastating secret and a thirst for revenge. As the clock ticks down, Bond must dismantle a diabolical plot to trigger international destruction, forging uneasy alliances and facing a beautiful, enigmatic adversary who is much more than she seems.

Peter Berg's Dune

In a distant future, the desert planet Arrakis is the sole source of the Spice Melange, the most valuable substance in the universe. When the Emperor decrees that House Atreides will take control of Arrakis from their mortal enemies, House Harkonnen, young Paul Atreides is torn from his lush homeworld and thrust into a web of political treachery. The handover is a trap: the Harkonnens, with secret Imperial aid, slaughter the Atreides forces and kill Paul's father, Duke Leto. Fleeing into the deep desert with his mother Jessica, Paul finds refuge among the Fremen, the planet's fierce native inhabitants. As he masters their ways and consumes the Spice, dormant powers awaken within him—visions of possible futures, terrible and vast. Embraced as a prophesied leader, Paul transforms from a reluctant heir into a messianic warlord. He leads the Fremen in a savage uprising against the Harkonnens, avenges his father, and seizes control of Arrakis. But victory demands a terrible price: to secure the imperial throne, Paul must marry Princess Irulan, a political union that betrays his love for the Fremen warrior Chani. The boy who never wanted power becomes Emperor, trapped in the same cycle of duty and compromise that destroyed his father, while Chani—pregnant with his child—watches with hollow eyes.

John Woo's Max Payne

Three years after his wife and baby daughter were murdered by junkies high on an unknown designer drug, undercover DEA agent Max Payne is framed for the execution of his own partner. Hunted by the NYPD and the mob, Max carves a bloody path through New York's criminal underworld, uncovering a conspiracy that reaches from a sleazy Bronx hotel to the glass tower of Aesir Corporation, whose CEO authorized the murders as a field test for a failed military drug called Valkyr. Betrayed by another partner he trusted, aided only by a contract killer avenging her twin sister and a Russian gangster with a code, Max must survive a city buried in snow and corruption long enough to put a bullet in the woman who took everything from him.

HBO's Bruce Wayne: Pilot

Bruce Wayne returns to Gotham, haunted by his parents' murder. Reuniting with his loyal butler Alfred, he uncovers corruption within his family's own company, WayneCorp. Aided by honest cop Jim Gordon and childhood friend Lucius Fox, Bruce narrowly survives assassination attempts orchestrated by the company's charming, ruthless chairman, Charles Palantine. Surrounded by new allies and romantic possibilities, Bruce chooses to stay in Gotham on his birthday, taking control of his destiny and setting the stage for a war against the darkness consuming his city.

View Askew's Preacher

A hard-drinking Texas preacher named Jesse Custer, possessed by a cosmic entity called Genesis that gives him the power to command anyone with his voice, hits the road with his ex-girlfriend Tulip and a degenerate Irish vampire named Cassidy to find the God who abandoned Heaven. Hunted by the Saint of Killers—an immortal, unstoppable gunfighter unleashed by terrified angels—Jesse must confront the monstrous family that murdered his father and forced him into the pulpit, culminating in a bloody showdown in the burning ruins of Annville where he finally breaks free of his past and demands answers from the divine.

David Hayter's Watchmen

In an alternate 2005, retired vigilantes investigate the murder of a government hitman, uncovering a conspiracy to unite warring nations—by slaughtering millions.

Zack Snyder's Rainbow Six

After thwarting a mid-air terrorist attack, veteran CIA operative John Clark is recruited to lead Rainbow Six, an elite international counterterrorism team granted preemptive strike capability. Clark assembles a multilingual unit of specialists and pursues ex-KGB agent Dmitriy Popov across Europe, uncovering a shadowy conspiracy targeting pharmaceutical companies. The trail leads to billionaire eco-fascist David Brightling, whose genetic research lab has engineered a lethal aging virus designed to cull humanity and "give Mother Nature a fighting chance." When Brightling's security plots to distribute the virus via cash at the Kentucky Derby, Clark and his team must infiltrate the event and stop the payout before 170,000 spectators become vectors for global annihilation—while Clark's kidnapped wife Sandy fights to escape Brightling's sealed compound.