'Walking Dead' Mazzara To Develop 'Omen' Series

From zombies to the antichrist, former "The Walking Dead" showrunner Glen Mazzara is heading to Lifetime to develop a show about Damien, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

Instead of re-imagining the beginnings of the demonic tyke featured in 1976's "The Omen," a la "Hannibal" and "Bates Motel," the show focuses on the adult version of Damien Thorn who "is faced with a series of macabre events and must finally face his true destiny: he is the Antichrist."

The original flick, which grossed more than $60 million domestically and was followed by two sequels, was written by David Seltzer, directed by Richard Donner and starred Gregory Peck and Lee Remick as adoptive parents to the hellion. As THR notes, there was also two "Omen" TV movies, a 2005 miniseries "Revelations" starring Bill Pullman, and the 2006 Liev Schreiber remake.

Mazzara will write and executive produce the show with his 44 Strong Productions production company. He is also writing "The Shining" movie prequel "Overlook Hotel." As for Lifetime, "Damien" follows "Witches of East End" and the apocalyptic "The Lottery" in a move to genre programming.

-Aaron Sagers

About that 'Shining' prequel 'The Overlook Hotel'...

EW's King portrait, by Tyler Jacobson

Yesterday we reported a Deadline article that former Walking Dead showrunner Glen Mazzara might be writing a movie prequel to 1980 film The Shining for Warner Bros., to be titled The Overlook Hotel.

Well Entertainment Weekly called up their former pop culture columnist Stephen King (and, of course, author of The Shining novel) to see if this was even possible. See, EW correctly asks if WB, which released Kubrick's film, retains rights for additional movie adaptations -- and, specifically, rights to a section of the book that detailed the Overlook's history, but which was eventually cut from the final version.

Said King:

"There's a real question about whether or not they have the rights to 'Before the Play,' which was the prologue cut from the book — because the epilogue to the book was called 'After the Play.' So they were bookends, and there was really scary stuff in that prologue that wouldn't make a bad movie. Am I eager to see that happen? No I am not. And there's some real question about what rights Warner Bros. does still have. The Shining is such an old book now that the copyright comes back to me. Arguably, the film rights lapse — so we’ll see. We’re looking into that."

But King did add that he's not necessarily going to stop a film project from happening because "I'm sort of a nice guy."

And maybe that's why he's the King.

-Aaron Sagers

Former 'Walking Dead' showrunner Mazzara writing 'Shining' prequel - and it might be cool

Former Walking Dead showrunner Glen Mazzara is checking into The Overlook Hotel, reports Deadline. Mazzara, who was dismissed from TWD in December, is writing a prequel to the 1980 Stanley Kubrick film The Shining for Warner Bros.

Although my fanboy eyebrow (my fanbrow?) arches skeptically anytime I hear about a remake, reboot, re-imagining or long dormany prequel, this kind of makes sense. Long before the Torrance family moved into the Overlook for a really bad winter, the hotel had a notorious history. In Stephen King's 1977 novel alone, the hotel was the site of illnesses, tragic deaths, the murder-suicide of a family, gangland-style murders, ghost children, snakelike fire hoses, zombie wasps, evil topiaries and, oh yeah, is kind of an extension of Hell.

Mazzara could use a prequel to play with a lot of this material that never made it into Kubrick's film (which also had a funky masquerade swinger party and Indian burial ground)...