Years after the release of Once Upon A Time In Hollywood, we’re still not sure what the next directorial feature from Quentin Tarantino will be – his mythical and much-rumoured 10th and final film. But, it sounds like QT could be getting back in the director’s chair in another capacity in the not-too-distant future. Seven years after Justified wrapped up on FX, the network is currently working on a limited revival series titled Justified: City Primeval, bringing the return of Timothy Olyphant’s Raylan Givens in an adaptation of Elmore Leonard’s 1980 novel City Primeval: High Noon In Detroit. And according to Deadline, Tarantino is flirting with the prospect of directing some episodes of the show.
This would be far from Tarantino’s first dalliance in TV. He famously helmed episodes of ER and CSI – and displayed a fondness for TV serials in OUATIH’s milieu. In fact, he’s written an entire series of Rick Dalton’s Western series Bounty Law which he plans to shoot one day. If the filmmaker were to be drawn to another TV show, there’s a certain poetry to it being a Leonard adaptation – since his 1997 film Jackie Brown is based on Leonard’s novel Rum Punch. And frankly, the prospect of Tarantino directing Olyphant as Givens would be something to be pretty damn excited about.
While Tarantino is yet to officially sign on for the limited series, City Primeval is currently being put together by original Justified creator Graham Yost, with Dave Andron and Michael Dinner on board as showrunners. Dinner will be lead director on the show, and Olyphant himself has an executive producer credit. The series will pick up eight years after the end of the original show, with Givens relocation from Kentucky to Miami, trying to take down the violent ‘Oklahoma Wildman’ which parenting his teenage daughter. It’s early days on the series for now, but is certainly one to keep an eye on – especially if Tarantino does end up signing on the dotted line.