Three months after standing down as California governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger is to return as a cartoon superhero version of himself, The Governator, he announced this week.

The former champion bodybuilder turned Hollywood star -- catchphrase "I'll be Back" -- has teamed up with Marvel comics founder Stan Lee to create the character which will star in an animated TV show and comic book.

More details will be announced next week, but Schwarzenegger and Lee revealed the plans to Entertainment Weekly, which published more details on its online version Thursday.

"The Governator is very simple. It takes my entire career basically, if it is bodybuilding, if it is action movies, if it is the governorship," the famously Austrian-accented 63-year-old told the magazine.

"It takes all those things and combines it into one. That guy is designed to fight crime, to fight natural disasters, this guy will be jumping into action," he added in a video clip on the weekly's website.

The animated TV show and comic book won't be out until next year, but Lee -- co-creator of Spider Man and a raft of other comic superheros, revealed that it will be based on Schwarzenegger personally.

"The Governator is going to be a great superhero, but he'll also be Arnold Schwarzenegger," he said.

"We're using all the personal elements of Arnold's life. We’re using his wife (Maria Shriver). We're using his kids. We're using the fact that he used to be governor.

"Only after he leaves the governor's office, Arnold decides to become a crime fighter and builds a secret high-tech crime-fighting center under his house in Brentwood," he added.

Schwarzenegger came to the United States as a penniless 21-year-old in 1968, but became a millionaire and won the Mr. Universe title four more times, and then shrugged off barbs about his thick accent as he turned to acting.

Joining Hollywood's royalty, his ominous "Terminator" catchphrases "I'll be back," and "Hasta la vista, baby" have now entered the English lexicon -- and he still uses them frequently as a politician.

Along the way he also married into a political dynasty, wedding Maria Shriver, a niece of former president John F. Kennedy, before becoming California governor in 2003, a post he relinquished in January.

(Read by Lee Hannon. Lee Hannon is a journalist at the China Daily Website.)

點擊查看更多雙語新聞

(Agencies)