Shane Black Headed Back To The Jungle For New Predator

Hawkins will direct this time

Here’s something we didn’t expect – one of the original Predator cast is spearheading a reboot for 20th Century Fox, and it’s not Arnold Schwarzenegger. But before everyone fires up their mini guns and portable nukes in protest, the wrinkle is that Shane Black’s the man headed back to the jungle.

Black, who gave his career a kick in the right direction thanks to co-writing and directing Iron Man 3 last year, has been attached to several projects, but Fox has approached him to work on a new Predator at the same time. The writer / director will figure out a treatment for the new film, but is then handing script duties over to old pal and Monster Squad collaborator Fred Dekker.

Predator and Black go back a long way – when the 1986 original was still in development, he was a hotshot writer with Monster Squad and, more importantly, Lethal Weapon under his belt. The studio asked him to re-write the script more than once, a request he refused. He was then offered the small role of Hawkins in the film, which he agreed to take, but still refused to work on the screenplay.

So now he’s back for a project that will likely already divide people into those who hate the idea of a Predator reboot sight unseen and those who are willing to give Black the benefit of the doubt. He’s also working on noir pic The Nice Guys and is still developing a film based on 1930s pulp adventurer Doc Savage, so Predator will have to wait a while…

from Empire News