MGM has paid mid-six against low-seven figures to pre-emptively pick up film rights to Steve Niles' comic book miniseries "Criminal Macabre" from Dark Horse Entertainment. The entire series, which is described as a horror project with strong comedic elements, centers on the life and career of supernatural private eye Cal MacDonald, who doubles as a hit man, ridding contemporary Los Angeles of its underbelly of monsters, ghouls and vampires who live among the humans and come out at night. MGM also owns film rights to those titles and hopes to develop a franchise out of them.

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