According to Deadline.com, Guillermo del Toro (Pan's Labyrinth, Hellboy) has teamed up with HBO to adapt Monster, the 18-volume horror Manga by Naoki Urasawa, into a television series. Del Toro will serve as co-executive producer and co-writer on the pilot episode, partnering with Steven Thompson (Dr. Who, Sherlock). Del Toro is also poised to direct the pilot himself.
The plot of Monster involves a doctor's search for the world's most evil sociopath, which surprisingly leads him to a 12-year-old boy. The doctor’s decision to save the boy's life sets a series of events in motion that could result in genocide. The project was first conceived as a feature for New Line Cinema, but was ultimately considered too massive a concept for one film.
Monster also marks the reunion of del Toro with Angry Films’ Don Murphy and Susan Montford, who had collectively struggled to get Universal to greenlight his long-awaited film adaptation of H.P. Lovecraft's At The Mountains Of Madness. While that project never took off due to the sticky issue of a possible R rating, del Toro's cred may be strong enough to make it happen if this summer's Pacific Rim is a hit.