UPDATED: The CW is heading to Crystal Lake. The network topper Mark Pedowitz today confirmed that the CW is developing Friday The 13th, a drama series based on the long-running feature franchise. The series adaptation will be written by Steve Mitchell & Craig Van Sickle, creators of the 1996 NBC series The Pretender through CBS TV Studios. “They are new in development,” Pedowitz told Deadline.

I hear that in the series reimagines the masked Jason with a stronger feel of grounded reality. Described as a sophisticated, horror/crime thriller, the potential Friday The 13th series is about the ongoing quest of a detective’s search for his missing brother that is somehow tied to Jason Vorhees, a long thought dead serial killer who has now returned to wreak havoc in the new Crystal Lake.

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The Friday The 13th series project originated last year when Emmett/Furla/Oasis Films and Crystal Lake Entertainment sealed a deal to produce a new hourlong dramatic series based upon the characters and settings of the franchise, with Sean S. Cunningham, who helmed the 1980 original, executive producing along with EFO Films principals Randall Emmett & George Furla and Mark Canton, among others. Bill Basso (Terminator) and Jordu Schell (Avatar) were tapped at the time to script a storyline that re-imagines Jason in multiple time periods.

Cunningham earlier this year hinted of interest from the CW, which recently quietly bought the the project off-cycle with Mitchell and Van Sickle as writers. The duo executive produce with Cunningham, Emmett, Furla and Canton.

Since the franchise was launched with the 1980 Friday The 13th, there have been 12 movies, most recently Friday The 13th in 2009 directed by Marcus Nispel.

In addition to Friday The 13th, the CW is developing a series based on movies The Notebook, Little Women and Frequency, as well as an adaptation of Archie Comics’ Riverdale. “I’m a big believer in titles and franchises,” Pedowitz said at TCA today. “It makes them break out of the pack in some ways.”

Friday the 13th was packaged by Gersh.