This past Friday saw some big forward movement for Paul Greengrass' upcoming untitled Bourne 5, with it being revealed that Julia Stiles will be back to reprise her role as Nicky Parsons in the film. Obviously that won't be the end of the casting process, however, and there's news that the project is looking to add an absolutely fantastic actor to play the film's villain: Viggo Mortensen.
A reporter from The Wrap has the scoop on this development, revealing the news on his personal Twitter account. As you can probably guess from the source of this news, there aren't a ton of details available about the character - though there's definitely a suggestion that this is hardly a done deal. Instead, the message merely says that Mortensen has been "offered" the part of the Bourne 5 antagonist, and it's unclear if he's looking to sign on, or even potentially interested in the project.
We we last saw Matt Damon's Jason Bourne at the end of The Bourne Ultimatum, he had discovered is real name - David Webb - and narrowly escaped with his life after exposing the highly unethical activities of Operation Blackbriar. As a result of this, two of the franchise's top villains, Albert Finney's Dr. Albert Hirsch and David Strathairn's Noah Vosen, were taken into custody, and a criminal investigation was launched into the actions of Scott Glenn's Ezra Kramer a.k.a. the Director of the CIA. This begs the question... who could this potentially-Viggo Mortensen-looking villain be? Will he be another government official higher up the ladder that Bourne needs to take down? Or will he be another trained assassin?
Viggo Mortensen gained notoriety largely thanks to his heroic roles - most notably in the Lord of the Rings and movies like A History Of Violence and Eastern Promises - but playing a villain in a franchise like Bourne could be a great move for him. Given his past work, hopefully it will be a film that allows him to go toe-to-toe with Matt Damon in a fight scene, though I could see him also generating a lot of tension and drama from a powerful government seat. Regardless of what kind of villain he might be playing, he would be a great addition to the series.
In addition to Matt Damon and Julia Stiles, Bourne 5 will also feature Alicia Vikander, who garnered a great deal of critical praise earlier this year for her performance in Alex Garland's Ex Machina. Universal Pictures has already carved out a release date for the project, July 29, 2016, and that means that production on the movie - which is being written by Damon and Paul Greengrass - should be entering into production soon. As such, you should be on the lookout for more news about this sequel soon!
