News Briefs: ONE PUNCH MAN Gets A ‘Fast And Furious’ Director, Yeoh Leads THE BROTHERS SUN, MR-9 Underway With Grillo, Hirsch In THE ENGINEER

• More than two years after landing at Sony Pictures and Arad Productions, Justin Lin is bouncing off of his former tenure on Fast X to direct an adaptation of One Punch Man from a script by Venom scribes Scott Rosenberg and Jeff Pinkner. Based on the hit manga from ONE and Yuskue Murata, One Punch Man centers on Saitama, an unassuming young man who joins the Hero Association for fun, only to be beleagured by his ability to knock out any supervillain with one punch. (THR)

• Kevin Tancharoen will direct Everything Everywhere All At Once and Master Z: Ip Man Legacy star Michelle Yeoh, and actor Justin Chien for 8-episode Netflix gangster drama, The Brothers Sun. Billed as an “action-packed, dark comedic drama, and family soap,” and follows a Taipei gangster who journeys to LA to protect his family whilst in search of his father’s killer. Sam Song Li and Highdee Kuan also star along with Joon Lee, Alice Hewkin, Jon Xue Zhang, Jenny Yang, Madison Hu and Rodney To, with Brad Falchuk and Byron Wu co-creating, showrunning and exec producing Mikkel Bondesen and Tancharoen. (The Wrap)

• Production is underway for MR-9, a new thriller from director Asif Akbar and starring Frank Grillo. Akbar adapted the screenplay along with Nazim Ud Daula and producer Abdul Aziz, based on Qazi Anwar Hussain’s Masud Rana novel series, with the first publication, “Masud Rana: Dhonghsho Pahar (Demolition Hill), setting things in motion. (Deadline)

• Emile Hirsch will reunite with Danny A. Abeckaser (The Gemini Lounge) for The Engineer. Kosta Kondilopoulos penned the script taken from true events which forsee the story of “Yahya Ayyash—the mastermind bombmaker who led an army of suicidal soldiers in Israel during the mid ’90s. The story follows the biggest manhunt in the history of Israel to find him. Hirsch will play Etan, the head agent looking for ‘The Engineer,’ with Abeckaser as his superior agent, Yakov.” (Deadline)

Lee B. Golden III

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