Showtime is betting there's drama in damnation. Deadline reports that the cable network is developing a series based on the comic book limited series The Damned, written by the amusingly named Cullen Bunn and illustrated by Brian Hurtt, who sounds like he should either be an action hero or a professional wrestler. The Damned will focus on a cursed man named Eddie who must navigate a battle between warring Chicago gangsters who also happen to be actual demons. Why would Eddie want to get involved in a mess like that? Well, there's the little matter of his soul, see...
The comic was originally published by Oni Press, and will be adapted by David Hayter, who's no stranger to comic-book source material, having worked on the screenplays for X-Men, X2, and Watchmen. I'm not familiar with the comic, but Wikipedia rides to the rescue with a bit more knowledge: apparently Eddie's curse means that he keeps coming back from the dead. Which doesn't sound that bad, actually, except for the part where anybody who touched him during one of his "dead" spells absorbs the fatal injury that snuffed him that time and dies in his stead. So let's hope he stipulates a closed-casket ceremony in all cases.
The original comic was set during the Prohibition, but Deadline's story says that the series will be set in modern day. I can understand the decision from a budget standpoint, but let's face it: Prohibition-era demonically possessed gangsters would be way more interesting than modern demonically possessed gangsters. Ah, well.
Now if somebody would just get around to turning J. Michael Straczynski's Midnight Nation into a show. Or Garth Ennis' Preacher. Or Warren Ellis' Planetary. Or Transmetropolitan. Or...
