The week is off to a good start for John Boyega.
Legendary Pictures announced June 6 that the Star Wars: The Force Awakens star will be headlining Pacific Rim 2, the second installment of a world created by Travis Beacham and Guillermo del Toro, as Stacker Pentecost's son. Pentecost was played by Idris Elba in the first film.
"I am very proud and happy to welcome John into a fantastic sandbox. The Pacific Rim universe will be reinforced with him as a leading man as it continues to be a multicultural, multi-layered world," said del Toro.
Aside from playing the movie's lead, Boyega is also on board the project as a co-producer, an involvement he announced through Instagram.
He will be joined by Femi Oguns for Upper Room Productions, working alongside John Jashni, Mary Parent, Thomas Tull and del Toro. Cale Boyter is also on board as executive producer.
Legendary described Boyega's character to be a lead role so it is unclear if Pacific Rim 2 will be incorporating cast members, like Rinko Kikuchi and Charlie Hunnam, who played Mako Mori and Raleigh Becket from the first installment.
Hunnam did express earlier that he would like a sequel to explore more of Becket's character, or storytelling in general, instead of the larger-than-life fights that involve Jaegers and Kaiju, but it remains to be seen if the character will indeed be part of Pacific Rim 2. If del Toro had his way though, he'd want as many of the first movie's cast signed on, but there's just a little problem: half of them have already been killed off.
Many assumed that del Toro will be at the helm this time around as well but he is handing over the reins to Steven S. DeKnight. Most of the director's experience is on the small screen but he is no stranger to superhero flicks, having worked on Smallville, Angel, Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Spartacus. He was also announced to be part of the writing team working on Transformers.
According to del Toro, having DeKnight as a director will allow Pacific Rim 2 to expand big.
