Coming off a huge Emmy win for When They See Us, Ava DuVernay has been tapped to helm an adaptation of Brian Wood and Riccardo Burchielli's 2005 DC Vertigo comic series, DMZ.
DuVernay, who is also working on a New Gods movie for Warner Bros., will direct the project with showrunner and Executive Producer Roberto Patino on board as writer.
“DMZ is a special project to me as it marks a key collaboration with my company Array Filmworks, the excellent team at Warner Bros TV and the dynamo Roberto Patino,” DuVernay told Deadline. “We’ve all worked diligently on this material, and I’ve witnessed Roberto in action. He’s insanely talented and cares about telling stories with maximum impact and imagination. I’m eager to share this one with DC fans.”
The comic is set in the near future, where a Second American Civil War has turned the island of Manhattan into a demilitarized zone (DMZ), caught between forces of the United States of America and secessionist Free States of America. This take on the material will focus on a female medic who is "trying day-in and day-out to help keep residents alive while trying to also find her lost son. In the process, that determined medic proves a source of hope in an America that has lost all sense of the idea."
DMZ is scheduled to go into production early next year.