‘Equalizer’ Filmmakers Considering Prequel With De-Aged Denzel

AI-powered de-aging is becoming more commonly used. And while he’s in tons of different kinds of movies, Denzel Washington is an unequivocal action star while appearing in the Equalizer movies. That being said, it's a little difficult to pull that off at 68. While Tom Cruise is not quite that old, the same kind of de-aging was considered when working on Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One. The team eventually decided against it.

Indiana Jones and the Dial Of Destiny is a whole other story, and a lot of people think it worked out pretty well. The technology was used to make Harrison Ford appear younger for the opening portion of the film. If a major franchise like that is willing to adopt the process, it does a lot to legitimize it all over the industry.

Sony

Antoine Fuqua recently spoke with NME about whether or not he wanted to follow suit with The Equalizer 3 — and revealed that they had considered doing some kind of prequel story about the younger version of the character...

I definitely thought about it a lot. Especially now with the new technology and the AI and all of that kind of stuff… Is there a story to be told about how [McCall] became this person – the younger version. I’ve had that conversation with Richard Wenk [a screenwriter on the series] quite a bit".

“I haven’t talked to Denzel about that yet, It’s all so fresh and new. I’m still watching. I’ve watched Harrison Ford’s film and I know there’s other movies coming out. I think Sony has one coming out with Tom Hanks soon. And I’m hearing the technology is getting better and better and better. So I’m kind of watching it to see where it goes.”

The Equalizer 3 is set to debut on September 1 2023.