In his first on screen role since Lost ended (though he can currently be seen in Neil LaBute’s play In A Forest Dark and Deep playing at the Vaudeville Theatre in London) – Deadline reports that Matthew Fox has just been tapped to play the serial killer part in the new film reboot of James Patterson’s Alex Cross detective series, formerly starring Morgan Freeman and now led by Tyler Perry.

In an attempt to shake-up his good-guy, heroic image, Fox will be morphing himself into a serial killer known as ‘the Butcher of Sligo’, a brutal and uncompromising assassin for hire who horrifically murders Cross’ wife and kicks off a cat and mouse game between the pair. Apparently Cross fans will know the character well.

Also cast is Ed Burns as Tommy Kane, Cross’ partner, unusually in this series appearing as a male. QED are financing the film previously referred to as ‘I, Cross’ and three studios are said to be vying to win the bidding rights.

Of course our anticipation for a new Alex Cross film series completely soured earlier in the year when the previously attached embodiment of awesomeness Idris Elba left the project and was replaced by the guy from the Madea films and they lost their director David Twohy (Chronicles of Riddick, A Perfect Getaway), but we do commend Hollywood for attempting to get a cop series based on a black lead onto the big screen, as they are few and far between.

Unfortunately, studio hack Rob Cohen (xXx, Stealth) is still attached to helm Mark Moss’s script and you would have to be a very forgiving and optimistic fellow to look at his diabolical CV (which also includes The Mummy 4 and The Skulls) and think he can do anything notable with this.

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