DC Comics/Getty ImagesAMC is staying in the comic book business. The network has ordered Preacher to pilot. The series hails from Seth Rogen, his Superbad partner Evan Goldberg and Breaking Bad's Sam Caitlin.
"Every once in a while you find a project where all the elements line up beautifully. With Preacher, it starts with a bold, compelling, and thought-provoking comic book series from Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon and a whole lot of fans who already know Jesse Custer, Cassidy, and Tulip," Joel Stillerman, AMC's executive vice president of original programming, production and digital content, said in a statement. "Add to that the passionate and talented Seth Rogen, Evan Goldberg and Sam Catlin, an incredible producing team in Neal Moritz, the Original Film team and our good friends at Sony Pictures Television, and we have everything we need to be VERY excited to move forward on Preacher."
Rogen and Goldberg are attached to direct with Caitlin penning the pilot.
"Preacher has been our favorite comic since it first came out," Rogen and Goldberg said in a joint statement. "Garth Ennis is one of our idols and it's an incredible honor to be working on this. We promise we won't make too many dick jokes and ruin it."
The Vertigo comic from the 1990s follows Jesse Custer (yet to be cast), a conflicted preacher in a small Texan town who merges with a heavenly being and gains the ability to make people do hatever he says. He embarks on a journey to find God with his ex-girlfriend, Tulip, and Cassidy, an Irish vampire.
"Steve Dillon and I are extremely pleased to know AMC has taken Preacher to pilot. We have had an ongoing voice in the efforts of the writers whom Sony TV and Original Film entrusted with this project, Seth Rogen, Evan Goldberg, and Sam Catlin, and have been most gratified that they continue to include us, and that they have tackled the project with the type of unwavering commitment and courage needed to present the material as Steve and I intended," Ennis said in a statement. "This has been a long time coming, but that it continues apace, and with the chance to be delivered episodically, gives Preacher an opportunity to be seen in its best possible medium, not previously possible. And many thanks indeed to Ken Levin and Neal Moritz for their never flagging commitment to Preacher, and for never giving up well past the point when I myself grew skeptical—we have principally gotten to where we are today because of Neal and Ken."
Comic book-based TV shows live or will potentially soon live on every major broadcast network. The CW has The Flash, Arrow and iZombie in the wings, NBC has Constantine, ABC has Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and the upcoming Agent Carter, Fox has Gotham and CBS has a Supergirl TV series in the works. And that's just the tip of the iceberg.
AMC plans to produce the pilot in summer 2015 and it could go to series in 2016. The network currently has The Walking Dead, based on the image comic of the same name, and is developing a companion/spinoff series for it.