Comic-Con is a wonderful place, one where exciting scoops can emerge from unexpected places. Attendees at the panel for Alexandre Aja’s upcoming Horns, a Daniel Radcliffe-led horror comedy about a young man trying to solve his girlfriend’s murder (which looks amazing by the way), were treated to plenty of information about that project, but one well-placed question led to an update about an entirely different but also promising project – Universal’s comic adaptation Locke & Key.
Joe Hill, the comic-book artist whose novel served as the inspiration for Horns, delivered the news, confirming that the long-in-development project will in fact be a trilogy and is currently taking shape at Universal Pictures. Albert Torres, the screenwriter of Henry Poole is Here, the upcoming Akira remake and an announced live-action version of Ben 10, has been tapped to adapt the L0cke & Key comic-book series, which Hill co-wrote with Gabriel Rodriguez.
Alex Kurtzman, Roberto Orci and Bobby Cohen are all on board as producers, in addition to Ted Adams, CEO and publisher of IDW Publishing, which put out Locke & Key. The project appears to be healthy, and Hill seemed confident that it won’t fall apart like the Fox TV series adaptation, which shot a pilot and never moved past that stage. Let’s hope this movie does come together, seeing as the story is very interesting.
Locke & Key follows three siblings who move to their ancestral, mysterious home in Maine, called Keyhouse, after the grisly murder of their father. After uncovering magical keys on the property, the siblings begin to gain strange and extraordinary abilities, but they don’t realize that taking the keys, which a mighty demon also wants, has placed their lives in peril.
No word yet on when Universal is aiming to release Locke & Key, but we’d imagine that the studio wants to approach this one carefully, so as to increase its chances of spawning a trilogy.
