Hey, remember when the rumor was going around that Ninja Assassin was actually an adaptation of the anime Ninja Scroll? It’s not, but maybe all that talk convinced somebody at Warner Bros that it would be a good idea to snatch that property as well.

Alex Tse (one of the writers on Watchmen) has been hired to write a script for the studio; Leonardo DiCaprio’s Appian Way is one of the producers. The original anime is apparently hard R and filled with sex and violence. I imagine that this will be the same, although who knows what commercialism lurks in the hearts of studio execs. Me, I’m partial to movies where, when a limb is hacked off with a sword, an unreal amount of blood sprays from the stump.

Tse is doing well for himself: he’s written The Winter of Frankie Machine, which awaits the directorial prowess of Michael Mann, and he also has an adaptation of The Illustrated Man on his plate, which would reteam him with Zack Snyder.