Brian Lumley’s Necroscope series is getting a multiple media adaptation

I remember reading Necroscope and some of the sequels to Brian Lumley’s sci-fi horror vampire Necroscope series and thoroughly enjoyed it. Looks like it may be time to dive back in as it is being adapted by Morgan Freeman and Lori McCreary’s Revelations Entertainment across multiple media including episodic TV, animated features, video games, graphic novels and emerging formats.

That’s a lot of stuff!

This is the first book’s synopsis.

Harry Keogh is a necroscope – he knows the thoughts of corpses in their graves. Unfortunately for Harry, his talent works both ways. The outer limits of horror are unleashed when Harry Keogh is recruited by the E-Branch (E for ESP) of the British Secret Service to combat his own evil counterpart, the deadly Romanian Boris Dragosani.

Long buried in hallowed ground, bound by earth and silver, the master vampire schemes and plots. Trapped in unlife, neither dead nor living, Thibor Ferenczy hungers for freedom and revenge.

The vampire’s human tool is Boris Dragosani, part of a super-secret Soviet spy agency. Dragosani is an avid pupil, eager to plumb the depthless evil of the vampire’s mind. Ferenczy teaches Dragosani the awful skills of the necromancer, gives him the ability to rip secrets from the mind and bodies of the dead.

Dragosani works not for Ferenczy’s freedom but is in the pay of an ultra-secret Soviet paranormal agency over which he means to gain power for himself with knowledge raped from the dead. His speciality is tearing secrets from the souls of newly dead traitors.

His only opponent: Harry Koegh. Like Dragosani, Harry is a necroscope who can speak with the dead. But Harry is a champion of the dead – and the living.

From the Romanian mausoleum where the undead vampire tests the limits of his bonds, the stage is set for the most horrifying, violent supernatural confrontation ever when Harry Keogh is recruited by the British Secret Service to take on Dragosani.

To protect Harry, the dead will do anything – even rise from their graves!

Deadline had the news that McCreary (Invictus, Madam Secretary) and Gary Lucchesi (Underworld, Million Dollar Baby, Exorcism of Emily Rose) of Revelations are teaming with Glenn Hetrick (Star Trek Discovery, Face-Off) and Michael McKay (Underworld Blood Wars, The Boy).

McKay had this to say about the project. “It is far too epic… and simply too good… to relegate it to a single film. We have a nuanced, layered tapestry of science-fiction/horror unlike anything that has ever been put on screen… it is a once in a lifetime project, it deserves to be savored. The material deserves that, and so does the audience. There is so much to love about this series – but for me it boils down to one thing… GREATEST BAD GUY EVER!”

Hetrick continued. “I am fully committed to breathing life into every molecule of the visually compelling elements that comprise this sprawling literary universe, and I intend to do so with a terrifying veracity. It is, in short, my life’s work. Coupled with an integrity to both character & story, this unique approach will allow us to ‘peel back the curtain’ for a brand-new generation of global audience members while honoring the heritage so adored by the massive fan base. Of course, we will follow Harry Keogh through his journey while discovering the dread secrets of the shapeshifting, alien Vamphyri… and by plotting the main arcs across multiple seasons, we have the opportunity to take a deep dive into the diverse, global roster of psychic agents as they help to unveil their shocking origin. The adaptation work leans heavily into the verisimilitude of Lumley’s rich, supernatural mythology – specifically in regard to its parallels with real world philosophies, religions and history… the science of Magick… grounding our story in the most terrifying fictional reality ever created.”

Sounds like they have a lot of passion for the original books so I am going to be cautiously optimistic about this one. Hopefully it won’t end up being like the adaptation for Stephen King’s Dark Tower. That was also planned to be a multiple media kind of thing, but it crashed and burned.

Who would you like to see play Harry Keogh and Boris Dragosani?

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