Coming off the record-breaking numbers Extraction pulled for Netflix, the streaming service is getting ready to release another high-profile original movie based on a graphic novel. This summer Netflix’s The Old Guard drops starring Charlize Theron and If Beale Street Could Talk’s breakout actress KiKi Layne. Check out the first images from the action flick below:
The Old Guard will follow Charlie Theron’s Andy, an immortal who leads a tactical vigilante team with others like her. Andy is a modern shorthand for the name given to her 6,000 years ago Andromache of Scythia which means “man-fighter.” The character has lived countless lives and deaths and is at a point where she is tired. Charlize Theron had this to say about her upcoming character:
It was important to feel the weight of thousands and thousands of years on her. The worst part for her is just feeling like she’s not doing anything. So what is the point, you know? She’s lost faith, not just in herself but in humanity. I think a lot of people can relate to that at this moment in time. We go through periods in life where we just look at the world and go, Oh, my God… You just feel like you’re pushing a rock up a mountain.
Her tactical team goes after human traffickers, terrorists and such. When Charlize Theron read the graphic novel from Image Comics, she told Vanity Fair she was excited for the film to ask some deep questions about the state of humanity in the modern age. The Old Guard has the team fighting to keep their identity a secret after they discover KiKi Layne’s U.S. Marine character Nile Freeman.
The Old Guard is written by the original author of the graphic novel series Greg Rucka. The writer has previously seen adaptations of his comic book Whiteout in 2009, ABC’s Stumptown currently in its first season and the upcoming Ridley Scott film Queen & Country. The Netflix release is directed by Love & Basketball’s Gina Prince-Bythewood.
The tone of the film is drawn from the likes of Kathyrn Bigelow’s Zero Dark Thirty and Tony Scott’s Man on Fire. Charlize Theron is also a producer on the film. The new images reveal a short black haircut for the Mad Max actress who is throwing her share of punches and packed with artillery.
The movie was announced in early 2019 and filmed in Europe last spring. Along with Theron and Layne, the movie also stars the live-action Aladdin’s Jafar Marwan Kenzari, Matthias Schoenaerts, Luca Marinelli and Chiwetel Ejiofor.
Theron may also team up with Netflix again for a sequel to 2017’s Atomic Blonde with producer Beth Kono, who is another producer on The Old Guard, along with working with the actress for Tully and Long Shot. The Old Guard is among many of the streaming services exciting 2020 releases and kind of sounds like a gritty Eternals. It will be available on Netflix July 10.
