Netflix has officially confirmed that they’re diving into the world of Joe Hill and Gabriel Rodriguez’s comic series Locke & Key, giving a 10 episode order to the series which was previously in development at competitor Hulu.
Locke & Key is a horror/fantasy series that revolves around three siblings who, after the gruesome murder of their father, move to their ancestral home in Massachusetts only to find the house has magical keys that give them a vast array of powers and abilities. Little do they know, a devious demon also wants the keys, and will stop at nothing to attain them.
The IDW Publishing Locke & Key comic book franchise, co-created by Joe Hill and Gabriel Rodriguez, has garnered both awards and acclaim during its ten-year run; has been translated into dozens of languages across the globe; and has sold millions of copies worldwide.
Meredith Averill (The Good Wife) will co-showrun the series with Carlton Cuse. Cuse and series co-creator Joe Hill (the son of Stephen King) co-write the first episode with Aron Eli Coleite. The new series will not retain any of the cast or footage used from Hulu’s attempt at adapting the series, instead completely re-developing the series and re-casting the parts except for IT‘s Jackson Robert Scott’ who will stay on from the Hulu version. The previous series’ pilot was directed by IT‘s Andy Muschietti.
Lindsey Springer for Cuse’s production company Genre Arts will executive produce alongside David Alpert and Rick Jacobs of Circle of Confusion. Andy and Barbara Muschietti (IT, Mama) will executive produce alongside Ted Adams and David Ozer from IDW Entertainment.
Locke & Key has had a long history of making it to another medium with Dimension Films purchasing the rights in 2008. Following that, a television series was in development at FOX in 2010 (which was even given a series order, but never went forward after the pilot was produced), and finally a failed film adaptation with producers Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci in 2014 with Universal Pictures. The failed pilot by Hulu is just the most recent link in the series’ attempts to come to life.
