-By Borys Kit

Guy Ritchie has signed on to direct his first superhero movie, “Lobo,” a big-screen translation of the DC Comics anti-hero.

Silver Pictures is co-producing the Warners production with Weed Road. Joel Silver, Akiva Goldsman, and Andrew Rona are producing.

Lobo is an blue-skinned cigar-chomping alien who is an interstellar mercenary and bounty hunter. The character is one of DC’s more recent creations (he was introduced in the 1980s by creators Roger Slifer and Keith Giffen) and for a brief run in the 1990s, was one of comicdom’s most popular characters.

Lobo was meant to serve as a parody of violent heroes such as Wolverine and the Punisher, with his stories featuring a nihilistic streak tinged with dark comedy and excessive violence. (One story had him killing his daughter and all his illegitimate children that she had amassed to rub him out.)

Don Payne wrote the script.

Jon Berg is shepherding for Warners, which is looking to begin production early next year. Gregory Noveck oversees for DC.

Steve Richards and Kerry Foster are exec producing.

Doug Liman was previously attached to direct the project, though Silver, who has been developing the project for the last 10 years, was looking to reunite with Ritchie, with whom he just wrapped “Sherlock Holmes.”

Ritchie, repped by CAA, is also attached to direct “The Gamekeeper,” based on the Virgin Comics title.
-Nielsen Business Media