I was lucky enough to pick up the 1st issue of The Walking Dead on a total fluke when it first came out. I’d been out of the comic scene for about three or four years, but I’d just graduated high school and didn’t really have a whole lot to do for the summer, so I decided to hit up the local comic shop one day. There it was: Walking Dead #1. My mind was blown and I was addicted to comics again. I made it up to about issue #32 before my comic addiction became way too expensive (I was seriously spending $100 – $300 on comics a week) and I had to give it a rest for a while.

I may have fallen out of the series, but I can recall reading the editor’s notes and letters in the back of early issues and, even then, a few years ago, they were mentioning a TV series. Although, I was thinking more along the lines of something like Showtime or HBO, not AMC.

Although the development deal isn’t officially set in stone yet, Frank Darabont (The Mist, The Green Mile, The Shawshank Redemption) is set to write and direct.

Variety reports:

Cabler is close to finalizing one of the richest development deals ever with Darabont to write and direct a series adaptation of the Image Comics graphic novel series “The Walking Dead,” penned by Robert Kirkman. Gale Anne Hurd of Valhalla Motion Pictures and David Alpert of Circle of Confusion are also on board to exec produce.

Project is set among a group of zombie survivors of an apocalypse who are led by a police officer, Rick Grimes, in search of a safe place to live. Numerous editions of the “Walking Dead” graphic novels have been published since 2003.

Joel Stillerman, AMC’s senior veep of programming, production and original content, said the project appealed to the cabler because of “the quality of the storytelling” in Kirkman’s work. The series will stay faithful to the tone of the original novels, he said.

“This is not about zombies popping out of closets,” Stillerman said. “This is a story about survival, and the dynamics of what happens when a group is forced to survive under these circumstances. The world (in ‘Walking Dead’) is portrayed in a smart, sophisticated way.”