While Halloween only comes once a year, horror films are the trick that’s a treat all year round. Perhaps nobody knows that better than John Carpenter, who’s been giving us the shivers since the 1970s. The recent news that Carpenter will be adapting the popular comic series Darkchylde could be the best news in a long timeboth for fans of the comic, and for Carpenter himself.Darkchylde, created by writer/artist Randy Queen, first appeared in 1996. The basic plot involves a teenage girl named Ariel Chylde who is plagued by nightmares of horrific creatures. However, Chylde is no damsel in distress. She has the uncanny ability to transform into the creatures of her dreamsan ability she’ll need when dark forces start assaulting the small town she calls home. The comic’s a hit with underground and female audiences, and has teamed up with other indie comic characters such as Spawn, the Darkness, Painkiller Jane, and Witchblade. A film adaptation was first announced in 2007, without Carpenter’s name attached to it. On Halloween 2010, Carpenter confirmed that he would direct. You can view the tantalizing teaser poster at comingsoon.net.This film could be a great revival for Carpenter’s fortune. For better or worse, the director has never been one to let his career become stagnant. When Carpenter’s career began, he was a low-budget, independent movie wunderkind. His first directed film was Dark Star (1974), a black comedy that just happened to be set in one of Carpenter’s favorite genres, science-fiction. In addition to directing, Carpenter co-wrote (with Dan O’Bannon), produced, and composed the musical score for the film. A young Roger Ebert gave the film three out of four starsquite impressive for a film made for only 60,000.In 1976, Carpenter directed Assault on Precinct 13, the first of his films that became both successful at the box-office and with the critics. This trend would continue with 1978′s Halloween, 1980′s The Fog, 1981′s Escape from New York, and 1982′s The Thing. However, starting in the late 1980s, Carpenter’s films started drawing in less audiences, although he continued trying new things: a Lovecraft-based horror film (In the Mouth of Madness, 1995); a sci-fi comedy with Chevy Chase (Memoirs of an Invisible Man, 1992); a horror film about a town under the sway of alien children (Village of the Damned, 1995).In the 2000s, Carpenter’s career has been recognized more for its influence than for his recent films. Remakes of three of his films appeared in the last decade, and he directed two episodes of the Showtime series Masters of Horror. Without having directed a film in nine years, Carpenter recently premiered his latest film, The Ward with Amber Heard, on September 13, 2010 at the Toronto International Film Festival. Darkchylde has yet to get a release date announcement, but from what we’ve seen, we can hardly wait.