Former Blink-182 Member Tom DeLonge Making Directorial Debut With 'Strange Times'

Co-founder and former member of Blink-182, Tom DeLonge, is making his feature directorial debut with Strange Times, a movie that sounds right up the author and musician's alley. DeLonge, who's a big believer in aliens and "the phenomenon," is making an R-rated movie about skateboarders looking into the paranormal activity going on in their town. The film is based on DeLonge's Strange Times trilogy, a series he's co-writing that began with "Strange Times: The Ghost In the Girl."

Below, learn more about Tom DeLonge directing the Strange Times movie his first feature below.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, the skateboarders go on an adventure they didn't anticipate. DeLonge and all involved started the Strange Times series in 2011. Originally, it was a website on the "unexplained phenomena," but then it led to a graphic novel and the trilogy of young adult science-fiction novels DeLonge is co-writing with Geoff Herbach. The first entry in the series, The Ghost in the Girl, was released last October. The story follows characters who appeared in the former Blint-182 member's first graphic novel, Strange Times: The Curse of Superstition Mountain.

DeLonge's band, Angels and Airwaves, is writing original music for the film, which is expected to start production this fall. The director and executive producer co-wrote the script with Ben Kull, based on some of DeLonge's experiences of growing up in California:

I grew up in Southern California as a disaffected young skateboarder who broke the occasional law or five, and I was always dreaming about the world around me, obsessively looking for the more unusual and imaginative experiences that life has to offer. That's the inspiration behind Strange Times, which is about the tribe of broken youth and the restless spirit that inspired me to form Blink-182 and seek out adventure.

Strange Times technically isn't DeLonge's first directing effort. The musician made the 2014 animated short Poet Anderson: The Dream Walker, which you can check out on iTunes. Here's a trailer for it:

DeLonge has been busy writing since he stopped making music with former bandmates Mark Hoppus and drummer Travis Barker. When he left Blink-182, there was some confusion over what exactly transpired. DeLonge said he never officially quit or was fired. He'd consider playing with them again one day, but in a Rolling Stone piece linked to above, it's clear he wants to continue pursuing other interests, whether it be Angels and Airwaves, comics, or UFOs. At one point, according to DeLonge, he was even working on a Marvel project, which might've involved Blink-182.