I don't know when exactly AMCtv.com's Sci-Fi Scanner blog came about, but after bringing us the news last week that Mathieu Kassovitz wasn't exactly happy over the final product that was Babylon A.D., they've continued their hot streak by landing an interview with "Lost" and Star Trek producer Damon Lindelof, who fessed up that he'd be just as eager to adapt Stephen King's series as he would be to see someone else do it.

"The Dark Tower is to me every bit as daunting an adaptation as the Lord of the Rings trilogy must have been for Peter Jackson, except we've got seven books we're looking at," said Lindelof, who then explained that doing that doing the films alongside the closure of Lost would be too challenging a task at the moment.

Not unlike Watchmen, King's series remains among the literary works that everyone else insists to me are positively OMG!-awesome and that I have yet to get around to (I know, I know). With any luck, I'll get to them before someone gets to the movies, which seems to be an inevitability with or without Lindelof's involvement.

[by way of Bloody Disgusting]

In this day and age, nothing can be kept a secret for very long. But Paramount Pictures may have done a better job than most, as an anonymous source claims they are already producing an adaptation of Stephen King's The Dark Tower series, and the first film is set to begin shooting this Friday with J.J. Abrams at the helm. (Ed: Yes, we know this is almost certainly nonsense, but it's still pretty funny.) This anonymous blogger claims to be signed on for multiple movies based on the fantasy series (his position is undisclosed). The blogger also claims the first adaptation is to have the biggest budget yet in Hollywood, and he says he doesn't know who has been cast as the lead. In his second post, put up on Saturday, he gives a very basic rundown of the shooting schedule for Friday and next week, most of which will be filmed outdoors on the Paramount lot.

Of course, if this was legit, it would be incredible news to fans of the books, fans of Abrams, and I guess fans of movies in general. Back in February, at the New York ComicCon, King announced the collaboration between he and Abrams for the project, but nothing was really said about when production on the film would begin, let alone that it would begin so soon. At the same time, IGN reported that Abrams was actually set to direct the adaptation and speculated that his secret Paramount project, titled Cloverleaf, was in fact The Dark Tower (there is no IMDb listing for a film called Cloverleaf). The blogger has already addressed the idea that people think he's a fake, but he insists that he is reporting the truth and that he has to be careful not to accidentally give away his identity because he signed a non-disclosure agreement. So, he has to be brief in details. He promises, though, that once shooting begins he will have photos up. Just in case he is legit, you may want to bookmark the blog now. Of course, if he's legit, I can't imagine it would be too hard for Paramount to figure out who he is and shut him down.

The biggest draw at this year's ComicCon was undoubtedly Kevin Smith, who has his legion of fans but is also known to be a fun public speaker. A close second, however, had to be writing giant Stephen King, who attracted a legion of his own faithful fans at his Saturday panel to discuss Marvel's Dark Tower comic book series. King arrived on stage wearing a Shaun of the Dead t-shirt and looking typically thin and frail; he was joined on the panel by comic creators Joe Quesada, Robin Furth, Peter David, Jae Lee and Ralph Macchio (no, not that one, and yes, someone made a joke about it.) Cinematical was on hand for this event, just in case King decided to drop any announcements about upcoming film adaptations of his work, including the most obvious possibility. He did end up talking up the potential of a Dark Tower film series, which he says is more of a real consideration now because of how well the comic adaptation has been received.

King seemed to throw cold water on the notion of Frank Darabont's involvement in the potential project, saying that he felt Darabont already has his hands full with The Mist and The Monkey -- looks like the latter project might be more of a reality than anyone realized up to now -- but he did finally make with the details about his rumored collaboration with J.J. Abrams on an adaptation. King has now clearly warmed up to the idea of seeing his most cherished work get a shot at feature film greatness. As for how he feels about previous adaptations of his work, he professed to not care too much one way or the other whether most of his film adaptations turn out good or bad. He also got a rise out of the audience when he gave a questioner a line-reading from Creepshow: "Meteor shit!" When asked at one point if there were any other works he'd like to see translated into a comic book form, King immediately blurted out "We were in the green room kicking around doing The Stand." More questions and answers below, all from random audience members.

Stephen King


Talk about the plans to bring The Dark Tower series either to the big screen or small screen. "Well, I've said no to everybody recently, because I just didn't think that the chances of it being a good movie....I mean, this is my life's work, in a sense. It's been there since the time when I was 22 years old and I finally finished it up somewhere in my 50s. So it's very important to me. Usually, about movies, I don't give much of a shit. My attitude is 'go make the movie and if it's good, that's terrific, and if it's bad, well then it will go to the video store, the back shelves of Blockbuster, and I still get royalties on the book.' I don't care that much. I hope they're good, because I'm a fan of the movies, but when the chance came to do The Dark Tower as a comic book, I thought this was the best of all possible worlds. This will look the way they're supposed to look. And when they brought in Jae Lee and Peter David, I just thought 'this is as good as it gets.' If you guys have seen some of the movies that have been made from Marvel comic books, you know they are really, literally as good as it gets -- a lot of times the books are better than the movies. They leave more space for your imagination.

The folks at IGN just pointed us to what they are calling an exclusive scoop, with "official announcement forthcoming": J.J. Abrams will not direct Star Trek XI, only produce. He is instead gearing up to direct The Dark Tower, as in Stephen King's The Dark Tower. To answer your next question, no, there's no information on whether the massive length of The Dark Tower series will mean this is one film, several films, or a television miniseries. IGN reminds us that rumors recently spread that J.J. Abrams was exiting the director's chair on Star Trek XI to instead take on a secret Paramount project called 'Cloverfield.' Does the word Cloverfield have any connection to Stephen King? Anyone? Anyone?

A recent interview with Frank Darabont on a Stephen King fansite led to speculation that he might be in talks to take on the enormous project, but this scoop tells us nothing about whether he will be involved. The Dark Tower, needless to say, is one of the biggest and most successful literary properties to go without a proper big-screen treatment thus far. It's hard to imagine Abrams and King would want to waste it on television, isn't it? I mean, does anyone remember The Stand? Surely the studio can see that the audience for a major, balls-out, $300 million series of films with cutting-edge effects would be at least as big as the Rings audience.