When I got back into comics in 2002, one of my must-read series was Fables. Aside from the gorgeous, eye-catching covers from artist James Jean, Bill Willingham stories’ cleverly re-appropriated fairy tales taking familiar characters like Snow White, the Big Bad Wolf, Little Boy Blue, et al. (known as “Fables”) and forcing them to build new lives in New York City. While there were individual arcs like the detective Big Bad Wolf (renamed “Bigby Wolf”) trying to solve a crime, and story centering on a revolt on the Farm where non-human Fables are kept, there was an overarching arc involving a mysterious figure named “The Adversary” who was responsible for taking over the Homelands and sending the Fables into exile. The books petered out eventually, but there was plenty potential for a movie, and now one is moving forward.

Hit the jump for more details.

According to Heat Vision, director Nikolaj Arcel (the Oscar-nominated A Royal Affair) has signed on to direct the adaptation, and screenwriter Jeremy Slater (the upcoming reboot of Fantastic Four) will pen the script. I haven’t seen A Royal Affair yet (I’ll be remedying that soon), but I have full faith in Slater handling the script. Furthermore, David Heyman and Jeffrey Clifford of Heyday Films (the producers behind the Harry Potter franchise) are on board to produce.

This isn’t the first attempt to adapt Fables, but it’s the best shot to make it happen thus far. Warner Bros. tried to develop a film in 2004 with the Jim Henson Company, but that never got to the screenwriting stage. Then in 2008, ABC was planning to adapt it into a TV series, but that also fizzled out. However, when ABC eventually launched its own fairy-tale-characters-in-the-real-world series, Once Upon a Time, in 2011, I was shocked legal action didn’t follow.

But that’s all in the past, and fans of the comics should be excited for the adaptation’s future.