'Deadpool 2' Director in Talks for Dwayne Johnson's 'Fast and Furious' Spinoff

02/07/2018 10:35 pm EST

Deadpool 2 director David Leitch is reportedly in early talks to director the Fast and Furious spinoff film starring Dwayne Johnson.

The Hollywood Reporter says the director has "emerged as the frontrunner" to direct the film, which will focus on Johnson and Jason Statham's characters.

The movie, tentatively titled Hobbs and Shaw, remains to be released July 26, 2019, so a decision on directorial choice will need to be made soon.

Leitch is preparing to release Deadpool 2 on May 18. He previously directed 2017's Atomic Blonde and co-directed 2014's John Wick with Chad Stahelski.

Johnson's character, Agent Luke Hobbs, has appeared in every Fast film since Fast Five in 2011. Statham's character, Deckard Shaw, was originally an antagonist in Furious 7 but became on of the Fast crew's allies during The Fate of the Furious.

There is no word on what the plot will focus on, but franchise veteran Chris Morgan is penning the script. Morgan was worked on all Fast scripts since 2006's The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift.

Johnson and pushed hard for the film to get made despite pushback from some of his Fast series co-stars.

"I have a tremendous amount of respect for this franchise that I've enjoyed droppin' blood and sweat in over the years," Johnson wrote on Instagram in October. "My vision is to create greater opportunities for not only my fellow FF cast mates, but for other amazing actors as well who want to be a part of something new and cool. I want to use my spinoff platform to create new characters that fans will ultimately love to have fun with in multiple chapters and platforms.

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