Last month, word broke that Timothy Olyphant will reprise his role as U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens in a Justified revival miniseries. The anticipation for Justified: City Primeval was already high, and it may get even higher now. Deadline is reporting that director Quentin Tarantino is in negotiations to helm at least one or two episodes.
Tarantino is best known for directing Reservoir Dogs, Pulp Fiction, Kill Bill, The Hateful Eight, Django Unchained, Inglourious Basterds, and his most recent film, Once Upon a Time In Hollywood. However, Tarantino making the leap to TV isn’t as far-fetched as it may sound. He has previously directed episodes of ER and CSI. Additionally, Tarantino is a big fan of the late Elmore Leonard, who created Raylan Givens and wrote Rum Punch, a novel that the director adapted as Jackie Brown in 1997.
Olyphant was also cast by Tarantino to play actor James Stacy in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. That’s another favorable link that may ensure Tarantino’s return to television.
Justified premiered on FX in 2010 and ran for six seasons before coming to a conclusion in 2015. Justified: City Primeval will be based on another Leonard 1980 novel, City Primeval: High Noon in Detroit, with Raylan in place of the book’s original hero.
FX has revealed that Justified: City Primeval will take place eight years after the series, with Raylan still living in Florida and co-parenting his daughter. However, this relatively peaceful period in Raylan’s life will come to an end when he comes across Clement “The Oklahoma Wildman” Mansell. Clement has been able to elude justice many times before, but Raylan pursues him to Detroit to ensure that he doesn’t get away again.
Dave Andron is the showrunner on the new Justified miniseries, and he will executive produce it alongside Olyphant, Michael Dinner, and original series creator Graham Yost. Dinner will also be the lead director for the miniseries. FX hasn’t set a date yet, but lining up Dinner and potentially Tarantino to helm episodes suggests that preproduction could begin soon.
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