Gerard Butler Will Adapt Fantasy Novel A DARKER SHADE OF MAGIC

Maybe you thought Gerard Butler would spend the rest of his life gunning down terrorists in a series of Olympus Has Fallen sequels. Maybe you thought Gerard Butler isn't the type of bro who'd have any interest in adapting a fantasy novel for the screen. Maybe you were wrong about, well, at least one of those things.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Butler is teaming up with Neal Moritz to produce an adaptation of Victoria Schwab's fantasy novel, A Darker Shade Of Magic. Here's how they're describing the project:

Darker Shade centers on Kell, a magician who has the ability to travel between parallel universes connected by one magical city, in this case London. Kell can travel between four parallel worlds within London, including Grey London, where residents believe magic is a myth, Red London (where magic is revered), White London (where magic is battled over) and the dark Black London, where magic has overpowered the people. When Kell meets Delilah Bard, a London pickpocket, he's whisked into a universe-hopping adventure.

The Hollywood Reporter goes on to say that Sony won a fierce bidding war for this deal, which is intended to include all three books in Schwab's series (the other two are called A Gathering Of Shadows and A Conjuring Of Light). Wouldn't it be something if Gerard Butler, of all people, ended up launching a new fantasy franchise featuring British pickpockets traveling between parallel universes.

Butler's next two projects, by the way, are an environmental adventure movie called (checks notes, sighs) Geostorm and something called Hunter Killer, both of which sound very much within his wheelhouse. We'll have more for you on A Darker Shade Of Magic as it becomes available.