Flashback to four or five years ago and it seemed like the idea of another Matt Damon-led Jason Bourne movie was a bit of a pipe dream. How things change. Not only did Jason Bourne open in theaters this weekend, but according to Entertainment Weekly (via Heroic Hollywood), Damon would be open to coming back for even more Jason Bourne sequels.
The Jason Bourne franchise has always operated as a sort of response to the James Bond series. Right as Bond hit one of his lowest and silliest depths in Die Another Day in 2002, The Bourne Identity arrived on the scene as a sort of corrective; serious, dark, morally tortured. The Bourne Supremacy and The Bourne Ultimatum followed, and so did 007, whose Casino Royale and especially Quantum of Solace aped the style and tone of Bourne.
Project Greenlight hits a stop sign, Project Redlight; you name the pun, and Matt Damon glumly affirms. The Jason Bourne star reveals that HBO’s revival of his and Ben Affleck’s Project Greenlight has come to an end once more, and might potentially be shopped to another network.
Matt Damon has done a lot of things: He’s played a super spy, a con-man, an informant, an astronaut, a genius, and all sorts of fun characters who could also be action figures. The one thing he hasn’t done yet is play a superhero, and according to the star of Jason Bourne, that’s something he’d be willing to do for the right director — like maybe his BFF Ben Affleck.
Here at ScreenCrush, we’ve made no secret of the fact that we think 2016 has been a disappointing year for summer movies. With everything from The BFG to Warcraft: The Beginning struggling in theaters, the evidence is stacking up that 2016 might be the worse year for summer movies, ever. Still, there is a glimmer of hope on the horizon: both Star Trek Beyond and Jason Bourne come out this month, and those two franchises have historically managed to balance smarts and action in equal amounts.
After an unfortunate break (yes, we’re looking at you The Bourne Legacy), Matt Damon is back as Jason Bourne in the coincidentally titled Jason Bourne. Today, the first full Jason Bourne trailer has arrived, and it promises a welcome return for our favorite CIA assassin with amnesia...