Image Comics' Underwater Thriller 'The Vault' Optioned For Film Development

The latest comic book story to get a development deal is The Vault, an Image Comics title written by Sam Sarkar and drawn by Garrie Gastonny. This one has a better chance of making it to screens than most, as Sam Sarkar is also an exec at Johnny Depp's production company Infinitum Nihil, and one of the producers on the film is Graham King (The Tourist, Rango, Hugo).

THR reports the deal, summarizing the comic like so: "the underwater sci-fi story centers on a group of divers who, off the coast of Nov Scotia, uncover a sarcophagus with unusual remains and inadvertently unleash an ancient evil."

Underwater? Translate to: expensive. But Graham King tends to get behind films that get made, and his GK Films is a company with a good track record in the past few years when it comes to following through on development projects. (OK, so The Rum Diary hasn't been released yet, but it did get made.)

GK and Johnny Depp tend to make films together (GK Films has a first-look deal with Depp's company) and so the natural expectation is that the actor might end up in whatever film comes to life from this deal. But that's way too early to call — lets see what happens with the scripting process first. The first issue of The Vault just hit stands this week, so if you've had a look, please offer some impressions below.