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Casper: Peacock, Kai Yu Wu Developing "Darker" Live-Action Series

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As friendly ghosts go, Casper has had a pretty good run for close to 80 years, jumping from animated films and comics to animated series and live-action films. But now, The Ghost Bride head writer Kai Yu Wu (The Flash, Hannibal) is writing & executive producing a live-action, horror/adventure series set in high school that will reimagine the origin of Casper in a coming-of-age story that explores what it means to be alive. When a new family arrives in the small town of Eternal Falls, Casper finds himself entangled in a mystery uncovering dark secrets that have been buried for over 100 years. With UCP (a division of Universal Studio Group) and DreamWorks Animation producing, the series is expected to utilize CGI effects to bring the friendly ghost to life.

casper
Image: NBCUniversal

As we mentioned previously, Casper the Friendly Ghost has been haunting the pop culture landscape for some time, beginning with a slate of animated films by Famous Studios that were released between 1945 and 1959. From there, Casper comics publisher Harvey Comics acquired the character and its success would grow and endure over decades. We're talking a huge amount of comic book titles, five animated television specials, Matty's Funday Funnies, The New Casper Cartoon Show, Casper & the Angels, The Spooktacular New Adventures of Casper, Casper's Scare School, and more. Of course, who can forget the 1995 live-action film take from Universal Pictures that starred Bill Pullman and Christina Ricci? As for how NBCUniversal gained the rights for a series, it all comes down to corporate "Hungry, Hungry Hippos." Harvey Entertainment was acquired by Classic Media in 2001, which in turn was acquired by DreamWorks Animation in 2012. Then four years later in 2016, DreamWorks Animation would be acquired by NBCUniversal. Serving as an executive producer on the Freeform drama pilot AZNBBGRL, The Ghost Bride developer & head writer also serves as co-executive producer on the upcoming Disney+ series American Born Chinese.

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Ray FlookAbout Ray Flook

Serving as Television Editor since 2018, Ray began five years earlier as a contributing writer/photographer before being brought onto the core BC team in 2017.
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