'Bourne' After Reading: Director Offers Update On Jeremy Renner's Bourne Spin-Off Movies

Does anyone really remember or even care about Universal's Bourne movies? Starting in 2002, there is now a quintet of Bourne films to wade through and an uncertain future for Matt Damon as CIA assassin Jason Bourne.

Back in 2012, when Damon was seemingly done with playing #Bourne, we saw a pseudo spin-off with #JeremyRenner taking the lead for The Bourne Legacy. Failing to win over critics or the box office, Legacy was a mundane affair that somehow still managed to be greenlit for a sequel. Fast & Furious director #JustinLin was attached to the project back in 2013, but all has gone quiet on whether the "legacy" could continue since.

Bourne again?

While it is hardly the biggest franchise currently in Hollywood, there is still a market out there for the Bourne films to live on in some form. Speaking to IGN, Lin gave us an update on where The Bourne Legacy 2 is, and whether Agent Aaron Cross has been disavowed for good:

"I talk to Jeremy all the time and, technically, it's still in-development but look ...Jeremy, I'm one of his biggest fans and I think I signed on because we'd been looking for stuff to work together and we still look for stuff to work together. It was just an opportunity at that time."

Although the director seemed enthusiastic about continuing the world of Aaron Cross with Renner at the helm, it all sounds very up in the air. The fact that Lin refused to comment on if a sequel was even coming certainly doesn't look good:

"It was actually getting to be really exciting, but I also realized that's a whole other franchise universe. and so to me my connection to it is through Jeremy and we're finding some really great things to hopefully work together on."

While Lin and Renner may be working on "great things," it is doubtful that it will be The Bourne Legacy 2. We need to bear in mind that we have seen #MattDamon reprise his role as the titular Bourne, and the aptly titled Jason Bourne was as equally lackluster as Legacy. That being said, Jason Bourne made a lot more money than Legacy, which is something that can't have helped the prospect of the Rennerverse carrying on. Also, with Jeremy more than happily pulling back his bow string to play Clint Barton, a.k.a. Hawkeye, in the MCU, where would he find the time to go undercover again?

However, we have seen much bigger franchises come back from much worse situations of development hell, so who knows what the future holds? That being said, in a world where Ethan Hunt, 007, and Lorraine Broughton rule the spy roost with Mission: Impossible, James Bond, and Atomic Blonde, do we really want to see this one "Bourne" again?

(Source: IGN)