Columbia Pictures Likes The Destroyer

In a story from Risky Biz Blog it seems that Producers Charles Roven (The Dark Knight) and Steve Chasman (The Transporter) will be making The Destroyer. The project is set up at Columbia.

This film will bring back the '80s action hero Remo Williams. The script will be written by Charley and Vlas Parlapanides.

The first books in the Destroyer series were penned by Warren Murphy and Richard Sapir. They followed the character of Williams, a New Jersey police officer who is convicted of a crime he didn't commit. Williams gets the electric chair, but his death is a lie so that he can be reborn as the vigilante character the Destroyer. He joins a secret assassin squad that is set up by the government.

With the help of an Asian assassin, Chiun, Williams goes after criminals and the people who framed him.

Murphy and Sapir wrote many paperbacks chronicling this character in the 1970s and '80s. New writers were eventually brought in, over 100 books were written, and this story is still being told in books today.

This first film will focus on the initial book in the series.

The novels achieved big-screen success when the film Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins came out from Orion in 1985. It starred Fred Ward as Remo Williams.