Plans have been coming and going to create a fifth entry in the Lethal Weapon franchise for several years now, but it seems as though the fans hopes of seeing Mel Gibson (The Beaver) and Danny Glover (Death at a Funeral, 2010) reprising their roles as the epitome of the buddy cop genre; Martin Riggs and Roger Murtaugh respectively; have finally been quashed, as Warner Bros and producer Joel Silver have commissioned a script to reboot the franchise with a brand new cast.
As of yet there’s no word as to who will actually be hired to fill the roles so perfectly fulfilled by Gibson and Glover, who will direct, or even what the basic plot will be; all that is known is that both Warner and joel Silver are planning on taking the series back to its edgier roots, and have hired Will Beall (a former police officer who patrolled South Central Los Angeles, and has written the script for Gangster Squad) to script the buddy-cop reboot that will maintain its original R-rated, fairly dark, tone.
This means that practically all hope of seeing Gibson and Glover reprise their roles as Riggs and Murtaugh has disappeared, because despite the persistent rumours, new scripts (the latest of which was written by the original Lethal Weapon scribe Shane Black), and demand for a sequel, there have been scheduling conflicts, script revisions, and hesitation to hire Mel (because of his, less than savory, current public image); much to the disappointment of long-time fans, who feel a reboot will simply be just another Cop-Out.
