It’s been a couple months since we last heard about the Stephen King and Steven Spielberg collaboration to bring King’s tome ‘Under the Dome’ to the small screen. Now more exciting news has been divulged thanks to Deadline. They are reporting that ‘Lost’ writer Brian K. Vaughn has signed on to bring the book to life and that the project will become a drama series for Showtime.

In the world of television, Vaughn is best known as the producer, executive story editor and writer for the ABC series ‘Lost.’  In fact his writing on the series has earned him a Writers Guild of America Award for best dramatic series. He also is an Eisner Award winner for best comic series for ‘Y: The Last Man’, ‘Runaways’,’Ex Machina’ and Marvel’s ‘Ultimate X-Men.’

Vaughn will have his hands full adapting the 1,074 page book as it contains a huge cast of characters and is similar to the ‘The Stand’ where it examines humanity’s capacity for good and evil. If you’re not familiar with the novel, here’s a book description from Amazon:

On an entirely normal, beautiful fall day in Chester’s Mill, Maine, the town is inexplicably and suddenly sealed off from the rest of the world by an invisible force field. Planes crash into it and fall from the sky in flaming wreckage, a gardener’s hand is severed as “the dome” comes down on it, people running errands in the neighboring town are divided from their families, and cars explode on impact. No one can fathom what this barrier is, where it came from, and when — or if — it will go away.

Dale Barbara, Iraq vet and now a short-order cook, finds himself teamed with a few intrepid citizens — town newspaper owner Julia Shumway, a physician’s assistant at the hospital, a select-woman, and three brave kids. Against them stands Big Jim Rennie, a politician who will stop at nothing — even murder — to hold the reins of power, and his son, who is keeping a horrible secret in a dark pantry. But their main adversary is the Dome itself. Because time isn’t just short. It’s running out.

At the moment, ‘Under the Dome’ does not have an air date but I’m hoping this project will progress quickly as the premise sounds very intriguing and entertaining. With King as executive producer, I’m sure Vaughn would want to make sure his adaptation makes the author proud. If you’d like to see what a possible television adaptation may look like, below is the trailer for the book.