TNT is looking to further reshape the television landscape by developing Dean Koontz’s best-selling Frankenstein novels into a series and putting a six-episode series order on L.A. Noir, officially returning Frank Darabont (The Walking Dead) to TV.  James V. Hart (Dracula, Hook) and his son Jake Hart will script the modern-day retelling of the Mary Shelley mythology for the Frankenstein series.  Set in New Orleans, the story centers on a war between Dr. Victor Frankenstein and his monstrous creation, Helios. Each survived a fight in the arctic 200 years ago, but the not-so-good doctor has been busy crafting an army of creatures that answer only to him.  The two sides resume their war with New Orleans caught in the middle. Deadline reports that the elder Hart makes his series writing debut with Frankenstein, making him the most recent feature talent to transition to the small screen.  Hit the jump for more on Frankenstein as well as news on Darabont’s L.A. Noir.

Lily Collins (The Blind Side) is the frontrunner to play Stormy Llewellyn in a feature adaptation of the Dean Koontz novel Odd Thomas.  Variety reports that Collins has emerged from a shortlist for the role that also included Emma Roberts, Kat Dennings, Portia Doubleday, and Addison Timlin.  Anton Yelchin (Star Trek) stars as Thomas, “a short-order cook with clairvoyant abilities who encounters a mysterious man with a link to dark, threatening forces.”  The story is set in a California desert town; Odd Thomas will shoot in Santa Fe, New Mexico in May under the direction of Stephen Sommers (G.I. Joe).

Read the book synopsis after the jump.

Anton Yelchin is set to star in the adaptation of Dean Koontz’ Odd Thomas.  Directed by Stephen Sommers (The Mummy), the book centers “Odd Thomas”, a young man who is able to see and partially communicate with the dead.  Thomas can speak to the ghosts but they can’t speak to him.  There have been four Odd Thomas books since 2003 plus a graphic novel prequel.  Bloody Disgusting doesn’t specify if Sommers’ adaptation will pull from all the novels or only from the first book.

Hit the jump for a synopsis of Odd Thomas.  Yelchin will next be seen in Jodie Foster’s The Beaver and in Craig Gillespie’s 3D remake of Fright Night.

Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein is in the public domain.  Anyone can adapt it, anyone can alter it, and you’re free to do what you want with the project and still call it Frankenstein.  But why be creative when you can pay fast-food fiction writer Dean Koontz money and adapt his take on the work so you can develop it into a franchise?  According to Variety, that’s the business decision producers Ralph Winter and Terry Botwick are making.  So Koontz’s spin has to be pretty impressive right?  Here’s what Variety says:

Project places the doctor — a socially prominent and successful businessman — and his super-human original creation Deucalion in modern-day New Orleans. The story centers on a pair of street-smart detectives who encounter Deucalion while investigating a murder, leading them to a bizarre array of “engineered” humans.

You can tell Koontz is really invested in the story because he wrote the first book, Prodigal Son, in 2005 and two of his thirteen books since then have been in this series.