A vampire film, Johnny Depp working with Tim Burton—some might say such things are impossible, but we have seen the upcoming Dark Shadows adaptation with our own naked eyes. The long-gestating big-screen version of Depp’s childhood-favorite supernatural soap opera finally has an official April start date, ending more than a decade of Depp mentioning his dream to play lovelorn vampire Barnabas Collins in interviews. As we previously reported, Seth Grahame-Smith—whose monster mash-up novels Pride And Prejudice And Zombies and Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter are both being adapted into films as well next year—handling the screenplay. In order to commit to his pet project, Depp will have to drop out of Kathryn Bigelow’s upcoming Triple Frontier (which co-stars Tom Hanks), but such is the thrall of Tim Burton, we suppose. Anyway, with Dark Shadows really and truly moving forward, you now have approximately a year or so to catch up on all 1,225 episodes. Get cracking.