DC Comic characters created by a Southampton professor are being brought to life in a new Netflix series.Toby Litt said it felt "unreal" that his work for the Dead Boy Detectives comics would be appearing on screen.He worked on the comics, which are being turned into an eight-episode series of the same name, alongside illustrator Mark Buckingham.Netflix is yet to announce a launch date, but it is believed the series will be released early this year.Dead Boy Detectives follows Charles Rowland and Edwin Payne, two characters created in 1991 by Neil Gaiman and Matt Wagner in the DC comic book series The Sandman.Mr Litt, now head of creative writing at the University of Southampton, took on these characters to write the Dead Boy Detectives comics between 2013 and 2014.His work on the 12-part comic series also saw the introduction of new characters, which are expected to be featured in the Netflix series, like Crystal Palace.He said the name Crystal Palace was inspired by his love of the football team, and he was on his way home from watching a match when he found out the comics were being turned into a TV series.Mr Litt explained: "The boys are the ghosts of two dead children who investigate supernatural crimes."Crystal Palace is able to see the boys and, in the comic, it's because she has had a near-death experience and, when she was at the point of being neither dead nor alive, she was able to meet them.""It feels unreal to think I will be watching things from my head turned into technicolour, fast moving, exploding fantastical things."Comic books were my way into reading as a kid. I write in lots of different forms, but comics are really demanding."The density of ideas and the closeness to your dreams - it takes a lot and I really wanted to do something my kids would like and something I would have liked if I was their age."
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