Yahoo News Bourne TV spin-off unveils its new sleeper agents
The Bourne Legacy revealed that the top-secret Treadstone project was never just about Jason Bourne. It's time now to meet some of their new recruits.
Heroes and Touch creator Tim Kring is bringing the Bourne franchise to TV for the very first time with the spy-centric thriller Treadstone, which introduces more sleeper agents who've been hidden in plain sight just waiting to by activated for dangerous government missions.
Deadline reports that Kring has cast Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again star Jeremy Irvine and Sense8's Brian J. Smith as the two newest agents activated by the CIA black ops group Operation Treadstone.
[Jeremy Irvine in Mamma Mia 2]
Like Jason Bourne, both Doug McKenna (Smith) and J. Randolph Bentley (Irvine) have no idea about behaviour-modification tools that Treadstone has used to essentially turn them into the ultimate assassins.
Bentley is already in the field as a spy when the series begins, but soon finds himself drawn into an international conspiracy – while McKenna is an oil rig worker whose awakening by Treadstone forces him to examine some hard truths about himself.
[Brian J Smith in Sense8]
The pilot will be directed by Ramin Bahrani, who most recently worked with Michael B. Jordan and Michael Shannon on the HBO adaptation of Fahrenheit 451.
This TV series could be the only Bourne-centric content that fans get for the foreseeable future, since Matt Damon was disappointed with the box office haul of 2016's Jason Bourne.
"It would have to be a pretty incredible story to get us all back on the horse," Damon explained. "This last one didn't do as well as the one we did 10 years ago, so maybe people are done with the character."
For now, Treadstone is expected to premiere stateside on the USA Network next year.
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