Victoria Mahoney has landed her first big studio feature directing gig. Mahoney, who served as the second unit director on last year’s Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker is being eyed to helm Kill Them All for Paramount Pictures. The movie will be based on the graphic novel of the same name, which was written by Kyle Starks and published by Oni Press in 2017.
According to a new report, Victoria Mahoney is currently in talks to direct Kill Them All. Josh Appelbaum and Andre Nemec, who have worked on the Mission: Impossible and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles franchises, are set to produce. James Coyne (Vikingdom, Puncture Wounds) penned the screenplay. There is no word yet on potential casting, nor is it clear how soon the studio could be looking to begin production. Though it seems unlikely that this would get rolling soon, given the current state of things
Victoria Mahoney made history when she signed on as the second unit director on Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker alongside J.J. Abrams, who was at the helm. Mahoney was the first black woman to direct, in any capacity, on a Star Wars movie. While Bryce Dallas Howard and Deborah Chow directed episodes of The Mandalorian season 1, Mahoney remains the only woman to work as a director on a feature within the franchise. Mahoney’s only other movie was the indie Yelling to the Sky, which was released in 2012 and starred Zoe Kravitz and Jason Clarke.
On the TV side, Mahoney has helmed episodes of Grey’s Anatomy, American Crime, You and the upcoming Lovecraft Country. For Paramount, this represents a way for them to get in on the comic book movie game. Marvel is tied up at Disney and Warner Bros. controls DC. That has left rival studios to look elsewhere for potential comic book adaptations.
Kill Them All was written by Kyle Starks, who also provided the art alongside Luigi Anderson. The book centers on a betrayed murderess who is seeking revenge and a hard-drinking former cop wants his job back. For them to get what they seek, the two must fight their way through fifteen flights of criminals, assassins, drug lords, murderers and accountants. This is far from the typical superhero comic. Instead, given the device of having to ascend a building while bullets fly, it is closer to action movies such as The Raid: Redemption or Dredd. The graphic novel is described as a “love letter to 90s action movies.”
The book was originally listed on Kickstarter before being picked up by Oni Press. It was initially published in September 2017 and was met with widespread critical acclaim. As for Victoria Mahoney, she is also currently working on an adaptation of the sci-fi novel Dawn with Ava DuVernay, which is being developed as a series for Amazon Studios. We’ll be sure to keep you posted as any further details on the project are made available. This news comes to us via The Hollywood Reporter.
