For a man who, not eighteen months ago, we had been led to believe was contemplating retirement, Denzel Washington is working pretty damn hard just now. He's been in Othello on Broadway with Jake Gyllenhaal, teased two more Equalizer movies, casually dropped word that he'll be in Ryan Coogler's Black Panther 3, and wrapped shooting on heist joint The Take (fka Here Comes The Flood) with Robert Pattinson and Daisy Edgar-Jones. And he isn't stopping there, either. Per Deadline's reporting, Denzel Washington is set to lead an intriguing new thriller from Mission: Impossible — Final Reckoning director Christopher McQuarrie at United Artists and Amazon MGM Studios.
Penned by Scott Barkan and Gregg Zehentner, McQ's latest — which doesn't yet have a title — will find Denzel Washington in familiar territory, playing a man seeking a shot at redemption (see also; The Equalizer trilogy, Man On Fire, Flight, He Got Game). This time around, Washington is playing a former police detective, serving a life sentence for an as-yet-undisclosed crime, who is granted compassionate release from the slammer when he is diagnosed with brain cancer and told he has just months to live. Reunited with an estranged daughter and introduced to a grandson he never knew existed, Washington's dying cop clearly wants to make amends and put his past behind him, but — whaddaya know? — his past has other ideas.
For McQuarrie, this new project will represent a return to the territory of past hits like The Usual Suspects and The Way Of The Gun after over a decade spent almost exclusively dealing with the Impossible Mission Force. Our mission then, should we choose to accept it (which, given that this is McQ and Denzel teaming up, we absolutely will!), is to be seated in the nearest cinema on October 1, 2027 when this one hits cinemas.