Thirty years after Stephen King's sprawling, epic novel "The Stand" was first published, it's back — this time in comic-book form.

In "The Stand," 99.4 percent of the human population is wiped out by a human-engineered superflu virus. And that's just the beginning.

The book follows the stunned survivors as they cross the United States and split into two camps — one led by the kind-hearted, 108-year-old Mother Abigail in Colorado and the other guided by the nightmarish Randall Flagg — before a final showdown over the fate of mankind.

Marvel Comics' adaptation begins in September with issue No. 1 of "The Stand: Captain Trips." (Captain Trips is the nickname for the deadly virus.) The adaptation is based on "The Stand: The Complete & Uncut Edition" and, like the book, will be broken down into three key parts.

The project is the latest in a fruitful partnership between King and Marvel. King and Marvel have teamed up on "N," a series of video episodes drawn by comics artist Alex Maleev and based on a previously unpublished story by King. That story will see print as part of a collection of King short stories coming in November and will be published as a comic-book miniseries by Marvel in 2009. Marvel also has been publishing limited series based on King's "Dark Tower" novels; the latest, "Dark Tower: Treachery," kicks off next month.

King is serving as the final overseer of the adaptation of "The Stand," just as he does with the "Dark Tower" comics, editor Ralph Macchio said.

"Mr. King has seen and approved the talent on the book, the character sketches, the scripts and all artwork," Macchio said.

That talent includes Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa, a comic-book writer, playwright and TV writer (HBO's "Big Love") who is writing the adaptation of "The Stand." Mike Perkins is the artist.

Aguirre-Sacasa, in an e-mail interview, called himself a huge King fan who first read "The Stand" as a sophomore in high school — when he should have been studying for midterms.

"I literally read it midterm week and completely escaped into it. So much so that I remember getting really emotional when some of the characters that I'd grown to love start dying."

Years later, he read the expanded version during a backpacking trip through Nicaragua, where his parents live. He read the novel a third time before beginning work on the adaptation.

"In reading the novel again for this adaptation, what struck me the most was King's characterization," he said. "The story's huge, obviously, and has tons of great moments (too many to pick a favorite, honestly), but what's truly amazing to me is how real and complicated each character is, from our leads to our bit players."

Aguirre-Sacasa had to audition to get the job. Macchio contacted him last summer while he was on a playwright retreat and asked if he was interested in tackling the adaptation. The answer, of course, was yes, and so Aguirre-Sacasa was asked to adapt the "hand of God over Las Vegas" scene from the book.

"I did the adaptation, it was given to an artist and submitted to King, I guess. Then, several months later, Ralph called and was basically like: 'It's on, we're doing this, and if you want it, it's yours.' "

The comic-book version is scheduled to run 30 issues or so. As with any adaptation from one medium to another, one challenge is deciding what stays and what, if anything, goes.

"So far," Aguirre-Sacasa said, "we haven't had to gut anything, any one sequence or any one character. But every day, it's tough decision after tough decision. Do we have to lose that back story? That's a great line, can we preserve it? I will say, though, that I've been surprised — and I think everyone's been surprised — by how successful we've been in preserving as much of the original material as we have."