Adam McKay To Direct Comic Book Adaptation 'Irredeemable'

Don’t think that just because Adam McKay now has an Oscar on his shelf thanks to “The Big Short,” he’s becoming a Serious Filmmaker. He’ll still be lending his pen to “Ant-Man And The Wasp,” and his participation in the Marvel-verse should already be a clue that he’s a comics fan. For years, he tried to bring Garth Ennis‘ “The Boys” to the big screen (Seth Rogen and co. are now doing it as a series for Cinemax), but now he’s got another project brewing that will bring panel to page to life.

20th Century Fox has snapped up Boom! Comics‘ “Irredeemable” as a vehicle for McKay with Tommy Wirkola (“Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters“) writing the script. And since this is the first time I’ve even heard of this comic, I’ll leave it to Wikipedia to summarize the first volume of the series:

The Plutonian, a powerful being once thought to be the world’s greatest superhero, has now become its greatest supervillain. He has destroyed Sky City – the metropolis he once protected – and has murdered millions of people across the globe. The series starts with the Plutonian killing his former ally, the Hornet, and his entire family. The remaining superheroes, the Paradigm – Bette Noir, Scylla, Cary, Volt, Qubit, Gil, and Kaidan – search for the reason behind Plutonian’s change by speaking to his former sidekick Samsara, whom Plutonian lobotomized. Former enemies of Plutonian attempt to work with him but when he offers them a way to earn his trust they turn on him, resulting in a self-destruct of the facility in which they are meeting. The resulting explosion kills Scylla and injures Cary, superhero brothers who are observing the villains. The United Nations offer Plutonian their subservience, hoping to avoid his wrath. The Plutonian takes offense when, after speaking to the Singaporean representative, he realizes that the decision is made out of fear. In response, Plutonian sinks Singapore into the ocean. Meanwhile, Qubit searches for Modeus, the Plutonian’s nemesis, using multiple robots designed to look and think like the villain.

So yeah, it sounds a bit more gritty than your standard Marvel/DC fare, and kicking off with a hero turning villainous is pretty neat stuff. We’ll see where this falls on McKay’s calendar, because he’s no doubt sifting through piles of scripts post-Oscar. But it is interesting this is one of the first to get his name attached… [Deadline]