'V For Vendetta' May Become A TV Series

Remember, remember the fifth of October — the day news broke that a V for Vendetta TV series is reportedly in the works.

Alan Moore and David Lloyd's seminal graphic novel may get the small screen treatment, after getting a movie adaptation in 2005 starring Hugo Weaving and Natalie Portman. While Moore has denounced any and all Hollywood adaptations of his works, perhaps a British TV series will come closer to his liking.Bleeding Cool reports that British TV network Channel 4 is currently developing a TV series based on the 1989 graphic novel V for Vendetta. Channel 4 is the network responsible for high-concept genre hits like Black Mirror, Misfits, Ultraviolet, and Humans.

No other information on the writers, showrunners, or producers for the show have been revealed.

Here's the synopsis from the V for Vendetta film:

Following world war, London is a police state occupied by a fascist government, and a vigilante known only as V uses terrorist tactics to fight the oppressors of the world in which he now lives. When V saves a young woman named Evey from the secret police, he discovers an ally in his fight against England's oppressors.

Moore has famously denounced the film version of V for Vendetta, which was written by the Wachowskis and directed by James McTeigue. After reading the script, Moore requested that his name be removed from the film and that royalties be paid to the graphic novel's illustrator Lloyd. The finished film is credited as "Based On The Graphic Novel by David Lloyd."

Moore, who also condemned the movie adaptation of his graphic novel Watchmen, had some particularly colorful words against film and Hollywood for the LA Times:

"I find film in its modern form to be quite bullying. It spoon-feeds us, which has the effect of watering down our collective cultural imagination. It is as if we are freshly hatched birds looking up with our mouths open waiting for Hollywood to feed us more regurgitated worms. The 'Watchmen' film sounds like more regurgitated worms. I for one am sick of worms. Can't we get something else? Perhaps some takeout? Even Chinese worms would be a nice change."

There's no telling whether Moore will be kinder on a TV adaptation of his graphic novel (Hey, it's not Hollywood at least!), but television, with its ongoing format and potential for complex character development, could be a better fit for the dense storytelling of V for Vendetta. I actually liked the movie and thought it condensed some of the novel's meandering subplots well, but I would welcome a TV series from the same network that brought us the original incarnation of the haunting and cerebral Black Mirror.