Dodgeball writer/director Rawson Thurber (most recently, co-writer Tower Heist) has been hired by Universal to rewrite their script for the adaptation of the Dark Horse comic The Umbrella Academy. Created by My Chemical Romance frontman Gerard Way and artist Gabriel Ba, The Umbrella Academy follows a group of seven superhero children who are adopted by millionaire inventor Reginald Hargreeves to, as he puts it, "save the world." I was introduced to the series' first trade paperback, Volume One: The Apocalypse Suite, as a gift a few years ago and really enjoyed it. Both it and the subsequent volume, Dallas, have a ton of action, wit, and fantastic art. Of course, this says nothing about how the eventual film may or may not turn out...

For more on the project, hit the jump.

Deadline mentions that Thurber's draft will proceed one by Mark Bomback who has penned such titles as Life Free or Die Hard, Unstoppable, and director Len Wiseman's Total Recall remake. The Umbrella Academy is currently the second Dark Horse property currently set up at Universal. The other title, R.I.P.D. starring Jeff Bridges and Ryan Reynolds, is set to begin shooting this September. Robert Schwentke is directing that film which is tentatively slated for a June 28th, 2013 release.

If you want to know a touch more about The Umbrella Academy, here's a synopsis for Volume One: The Apocalypse Suite [from Amazon]:

Gerard Way, of My Chemical Romance, makes his comics writing debut in this outrageous superhero epic that Grant Morrison called "An ultraviolet psychedelic sherbet bomb of wit and ideas. The superheroes of the 21st century are here at last..." In an inexplicable, worldwide event, forty-seven extraordinary children were spontaneously born by women who'd previously shown no signs of pregnancy. Millionaire inventor Reginald Hargreeves adopted seven of the children; when asked why, his only explanation was, "To save the world." These seven children form The Umbrella Academy, a dysfunctional family of superheroes with bizarre powers. Their first adventure at the age of ten pits them against an erratic and deadly Eiffel Tower, piloted by the fearsome zombie-robot Gustave Eiffel. Nearly a decade later, the team disbands, but when Hargreeves unexpectedly dies, these disgruntled siblings reunite just in time to save the world once again.