Garth Ennis & Jacen Burrows’ Crossed Movie Taps Rob Jabbaz As Director

Posted in: Movies, News | Tagged: crossed, garth ennis

The film adaption of Garth Ennis and Jacen Burrows’ Crossed has a director; Rob Jabbaz of The Sadness fame, with production set to begin in March.

Published Wed, 22 Jan 2025 15:17:08 -0600

by Rich Johnston

Last updated Wed, 22 Jan 2025 15:26:22 -0600

Article Summary

Garth Ennis’ extreme horror comic Crossed finally gets a film adaptation with Rob Jabbaz as director.
Rob Jabbaz, director of The Sadness, brings his horror expertise to the Crossed movie project.
Crossed was inspired by Romero’s The Crazies and Whedon’s Reavers, with notorious themes of violence and satire.
Garth Ennis’ increased fame from Preacher and The Boys boosts anticipation for the Crossed film.

We have to declare an interest in this sort of thing. Crossed, the comic book by Garth Ennis and Jacen Burrows was published by Bleeding Cool’s publisher, Avatar Press. And the planned movie adaptation, with a script written by Ennis, now has a director in Ron Jabbaz, who also made The Sadness. the Taiwanese horror film about a virus that made people violent, winning best horror film and best director at Fantastic Fest, the Austin genre-centric festival. Crossed has a budget of between two to three million and is planning a March shoot.

Garth Ennis photo by Pinguino Kolb, courtesy Avatar Press. Crossed #1 cover courtesy Avatar Press.

Crossed was an extreme horror comic book published by Avatar that saw the original ten-issue comic book series spin-off into several series, webcomics, and graphic novels after its initial publication in 2008, with hundreds of Crossed stories published over the next ten years. Other comics creators who worked on the franchise included Alan Moore, Jamie Delao, Si Spurrier, David Lapham, Kieron Gillen, Mike Wolfer, Max Bemis, Fernando Melek, German Erramouspe, Gabriel Andrade, Emiliano Urdinola, Fernando Heinz, Fernando Melek, Javier Barreno, Leandro Rizzo, David Hine, Raulo Caceres, Miguel Garrido, Christos Gage, Miguel Ruiz, Francisco Manna, Rafael Ortiz, Daniel Way, Emiliano Urdinola, Christian Zanier, Justin Jordan and Georges Duarte.

What is Crossed?

Ennis once said about the genesis of his now-infamous original Crossed series, “I had a dream that I thought was going to be about zombies attacking a house full of victims, but it turned out they weren’t zombies at all. They were simply people, grinning with psychotic glee at the thought of what they were going to do to the occupants of the house — which wasn’t going to be anything nice. Then I woke up.” The infected Crossed retain their intellect and personality but are driven to carry out the very worst human actions imaginable. With Ennis seeking inspiration from Amnesty International reports over just what acts humans can enact on one another, even when not infected with some amoral impulses. Those infected see a red vertical cross break out across their face, reminiscent of the St George’s flag painted on football hooligans’ faces, as well as representing the Crusades, adding a satirical level. Since its publication, its nature has been repeatedly criticised and has been repeatedly restricted.

In 2010, Crossed was initially optioned for an independently funded film, reportedly to be financed by Trigger Street Productions and produced by Michael De Luca, Jason Netter, and Kevin Spacey. In 2012, Ennis announced that he and Avatar Press had recovered the rights to launch a series of webisodes in an attempt to generate interest for a feature film.

Garth Ennis & Jacen Burrows' Crossed Movie Gets a Director, Rob Jabbaz — Crossed

Garth Ennis’s TV/Movie Cache Has Risen Since 2008

Between now and then, however, Garth Ennis has seen two successful TV shows spin out from his comics work, Preacher and The Boys – which now has its own spin-offs. And Garth Ennis’ name likely has a greater cache now than it did then. That said, in addition to TV series based on those two titles, comics written by Ennis have helped inspire the 2005 film Constantine (Hellblazer: Dangerous Habits), 2008’s Punisher: War Zone (Punisher MAX), and Netflix’s Daredevil Season 2 (Punisher MAX #7-12).

In August last year, it was announced that Six Studios were making the movie based on the original Crossed series by Ennis and Burrows, with Ennis’ screenplay. “It has been a real delight working with Garth Ennis and Six Studios developing Crossed for the big screen,” said Jabbaz in an arranged news release with The Hollywood Reporter. “From day one, our primary goal has been to deliver a faithful adaptation of the original series, along with a few new surprises. I certainly hope audiences are ready for this.” While Garth Ennis wished everyone a “Happy New Year. It’s 2025, and the world is catching up with the world of Crossed in all the wrong ways. So what better time to bring out the movie you’ve all been waiting for?”

Carl Choi of Six Studios will produce along with Benjamin Hung of Retro Entertainment and Ken Levin of Nightsky Productions. Hung and Levin developed the project with Ennis, then brought it to Six Studios. Six Studios‘ Jeff Huang will executive produce along with Ennis, Carl Amari, and Bill Patterson with David Guglielmo casting and Lillian Campbell as line producer.

Note: Crossed is published by Bleeding Cool’s parent company, Avatar Press.

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