Bill Willingham’s FABLES Coming To The Big Screen

When it comes to obvious movie ideas that should have gone down long ago, a Fables adaptation is way up there. Bill Willingham's Vertigo comic takes a who's who of fairytale characters - from princesses every kid knows to some deep cuts that had me running for "Volume F" of my Paper Wikipedia - and re-contextualizes them into an epic modern fairytale of his own invention. Not only is it a good idea marketing-wise, but it has the distinction of being pretty badass too. The list of great characters is as long as my arm, and I have an arm that gets longer every time I lie.

Now Fables is going to be a movie. And not just a movie, but maybe even a good one. A Royal Affair director Nikolaj Arcel is signed to direct, and screenwriting duties will go to Jeremy Slater, writer of the upcoming and exciting Fantastic Four reboot.

Fables is such a massive tale that it's hard to guess where this adaptation will begin. There's some definite franchise potential if they choose to underplay the Adversary stuff early on. Or they could just do it all in the first film. Or they could go the Star Trek route by making a really good first film only to blow their big bad guy load on their second go-round.

In any event, this is officially one of those films we'll be watching closely. Sounds like good news all around.