First reported by the team at Birth.Movies.Death., news that Donnie Yen joined the cast of xXx: The Return Of Xander Cage has now been confirmed, with a few new details about his role.
Yen is replacing Jet Li in the latest sequel to xXx, and will be playing warrior Xiang, who will cause serious problems for Vin Diesel's Xander Cage as the extreme sports nut/secret agent races to find and stop a doomsday weapon.
D.J. Caruso is is directing the new outing for the franchise, and Diesel stars alongside an eclectic, diverse cast that includes Deepika Padukone, Tony Jaa, Ruby Rose, Conor McGregor, Nina Dobrev, Kris Wu, Hermione Corfield, Toni Collette and Samuel L. Jackson, who returns to his role as Agent Augustus Gibbons.
Quite what led to Li's departure hasn't been mentioned, but Yen is a more than capable replacement. 2016 is big for him in terms of movies: this year he has Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon: Sword Of Destiny due via Netflix on February 26 and is the part of the cast for Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, which is out on December 16.