If D.J. Caruso's Twitter feed can be considered a reliable source on D.J. Caruso, then the Eagle Eye and I Am Number Four director has just closed a deal to direct an adaptation of Preacher, Garth Ennis’ supernatural Western comic that’s been passed around like an arse-faced foster child for over a decade now. Caruso took to what purports to be his personal Twitter page to announce, “My deal just closed on Preacher. Going back to the dark side and pretty fucking pumped!” And while there are still some doubts that this is actually D.J. Caruso’s Twitter—and if it isn’t, this “fake D.J. Caruso” feed is sort of brilliant in its banality—the announcement does seem to back up rumors that Caruso was circling the project, and now Collider says that it has “independently confirmed” that the deal is close to being finalized. But until we get official word from producers, let’s just put this one as a “strong possibility.”
Should Caruso actually be taking over Preacher, he would be the latest in a long line of filmmakers from Darren Aronofsky to Joe Carnahan who have expressed interest in taking on the adaptation, which has been alternately pitched as an HBO show or a series of multiple films whenever the overwhelming sense of futility got stale. Most recently, of course, Sam Mendes was attached to direct from a screenplay by John August that would have spread the story out over several sequels, and while it’s that version that Caruso mentioned when he recently talked about his desire to take on another comic-book project after the similarly stalled Y: The Last Man fell apart again, there’s obviously no word yet on whether Caruso’s would still be tackling August’s script.
And of course, Caruso is already supposedly attached to an adaptation of the video game Dead Space, so—again—if it’s true, there’s no telling yet when this project will actually begin filming. In other words, this is still pretty much like every other Preacher-related story we’ve ever reported. But hey, at least we found out that either D.J. Caruso or a very dedicated imposter is on Twitter; now excuse us while we go mount our “Fake Dennis Dugan” feed.