The Expanse is one of our favourite shows on TV. And while we wait for its return, we have some gleeful news: Thomas Jane, who plays the Syfy show’s oddly-coiffed but deeply-determined detective, Miller, has joined the cast of The Predator, Shane Black’s franchise reboot. This is ideal, and awesome.
Image: AP Photo/Matt Sayles
There’s no word on what role Jane — no stranger to reboots, having starred in The Punisher in 2004 — will play. On The Expanse, he’s nailed the character of a weary cynic who’s often underestimated by his superiors (partially because he drinks a wee bit too much), but comes through big-time when things gets dangerous. It’s tempting to imagine him in a similar role in The Predator. But Jane’s just one element of a killer cast: Boyd Holbrook (soon to be seen in Logan) is the lead, along with Trevante Rhodes (Moonlight), Sterling K. Brown (The People v OJ Simpson), Olivia Munn (X-Men: Apocalypse), Keegan-Michael Key (Key and Peele) and, presumably, several ruthless, occasionally invisible alien killing machines.
All we know about the script, penned by Black (who co-starred in the 1987 original, the same year he wrote Lethal Weapon) and Fred Dekker (probably best-known as the director of The Monster Squad, which he co-wrote with Black, also in 1987), is that it’s an ensemble movie with a “domestic” setting, that is, not outer space, a remote jungle or an underground Arctic pyramid. (Also, probably not a big city — because what could ever top Predator 2‘s Los Angeles invasion?) The movie starts filming next month, with a February 2018 release date.