Steve Niles’ Criminal Macabre Heads to Big Screen

Some comic book ideas just sell themselves. Take for example the latest Dark Horse Comics to head to the big screen: Steve Niles’ (of “30 Days of Night” fame) “Criminal Macabre”, which according to Variety, has a supernatural detective that doubles as a hitman, with his victims being the monsters that go bump in the night. That’s not just a movie right there, that’s also a great idea for a TV series on TNT.

Universal Pictures has already snatched up the comic book, and has given the job of adapting it for the big screen to Kyle Ward, who was recently hired to write the sequel to Timothy Olyphant’s videogame movie “Hitman”.

“Criminal Macabre” was written by Steve Niles and drawn by Ben Templesmith, the same two people responsible for “30 Days of Night”. The series follows a cop name Cal McDonald, a John Constantine-like fellow who takes drugs and uses a network of lurking in the shadows type to solve his cases. The character was originally created in 1990, and continued on in various incarnations.

Dark Horse Comics head honcho Mike Richardson will produce “Criminal Macabre” along with Neal Moritz via his Original Film banner.