LOS ANGELES — Can Valiant Entertainment pull off a Marvel-style comeback?

Home to superheroes like Spider-Man and the Hulk, Marvel achieved one of the most spectacular rallies in media history. With its shares trading for as little as 93 cents, Marvel went from bankruptcy in 1997 to Hollywood heavyweight in 2009, selling itself to Disney for $4.3 billion, or about $53 a share.

Now two professed comic book geeks — with backing from the turnaround specialist Peter Cuneo, who spent 10 years at Marvel in various roles, including chief executive — are trying to make lightning strike twice with Valiant, a comics company that was a force in the 1990s but fell victim to legal quarrels and bankruptcy. Valiant, which is based in New York, restarted its comics line in May, achieving strong sales, and has five movies in development.

“Think of us as Marvel 2.0,” said Mr. Cuneo, whose résumé includes turnaround work at Black & Decker and Clairol.

That is an audacious proclamation: Valiant does not have a single household-name character in its library. Financing is also a question. While the company is well financed as a start-up, it still must figure out how to raise the money to pay for its movie ambitions. But the potential payoff is too big not to try. Superheroes remain Hollywood’s most bankable genre — by far — despite fears of oversaturation and a generally troubled North American box office.