‘The Tommyknockers’ Moving Forward With Reported 2020 Release Date

The massive success of last year’s adaptation of Stephen King‘s IT has apparently caused many in Hollywood to take another look at the author’s classic stories to bring to the big screen, even if they had previously been given a live-action remake. According to Deadline, King’s The Tommyknockers is the next story to get the big screen treatment, with Universal Pictures reportedly winning a bidding war against Netflix and Sony while offering a 2020 release date.

Making matters even more exciting is that director of The Conjuring and Insidious James Wan will reportedly helm the picture while Roy Lee, producer of last year’s IT, joins him as a producer to bring the film to life.

UPDATE: A rep for James Wan reached out to us to inform us that Wan is not attached to direct The Tommyknockers film.

In the 1987 horror/sci-fi story, “On a beautiful June day, while walking deep in the woods on her property in Haven, Maine, Bobbi Anderson quite literally stumbles over her own destiny and that of the entire town. For the dull gray metal protrusion she discovers in the ground is part of a mysterious and massive metal object, one that may have been buried there for millennia. Bobbi can’t help but become obsessed and try to dig it out…the consequences of which will affect and transmute every citizen of Haven, young and old. It means unleashing extraordinary powers beyond those of mere mortals—and certain death for any and all outsiders. An alien hell has now invaded this small New England town…an aggressive and violent malignancy devoid of any mercy or sanity…“

The story was previously adapted into a miniseries in 1993 starring Jimmy Smits and Marge Helgenberger, which earned massive ratings and helped ignite further interest in made-for-TV films and miniseries based on King’s work. One of that adaptation’s producers, Larry Sanitsky, began reaching out with a statement last month in hopes of finding a home for the project.

“It is an allegorical tale of addiction (Stephen was struggling with his own at the time), the threat of nuclear power, the danger of mass hysteria and the absurdity of technical evolution run amuck,” Sanitsky’s statement read. “All are as relevant today as the day the novel was written. It is also a tale about the eternal power of love and the grace of redemption.”

Last year, IT went on to become a huge success, taking in more than $700 million worldwide and earning a sequel that hits theaters on September 6, 2019. That film had previously been adapted as a miniseries in 1990.

Stay tuned for details on the upcoming adaptation of The Tommyknockers.

Are you excited by a new adaptation of the story or will it be impossible to top the original? Let us know in the comments below or hit up @TheWolfman on Twitter to talk all things horror and Star Wars!

[H/T Deadline]