The Bad Boys are back in town — or at least they’re officially on their way. For years now, Sony has had a third installment in the action film series in the works, and it’s finally looking like it will actually happen. The studio recently announced that Bad Boys 3 — also known as Bad Boys for Life — will hit theaters in early 2020, as THR reported.
The action flick’s release date comes just a day after ThatHashtagShow.com shared new plot details. The online publication reports that the film will bring us back into the lives of Mike Lowery (Will Smith) and Marcus Burnett (Martin Lawrence) after their partnership has gone south. Burnett will apparently be working as a private eye, and Lowery will have a new “young and cocky” partner toward whom he doesn’t feel that much loyalty. At the same time, Lowery will be single and going through a midlife crisis of sorts.
Apart from the drama in their private and professional lives, there will also be an Albanian mercenary with his sights on Burnett and Lowery in a quest to avenge his brother’s death. Of course, they’ll need to team up to stop him.
Bad Boys for Life is set to bring back Smith and Lawrence, but the rest of the cast reportedly still needs to be filled out. Michael Bay, who directed the first two installments, will be replaced by Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah as co-directors, while Chris Bremner is the writer behind the most recent draft of the script. They’ll work alongside producer Jerry Bruckheimer, who has been a part of the movie series since the beginning.
These latest updates seem promising for the project’s progress, but fans may remember that the third installment also appeared to have gained momentum a few years ago. In fact, Smith said on Beats 1 in October 2015 that there was a “very, very, very strong possibility” that it would arrive in 12-16 months — which it ultimately did not.
The progress on the film might be slower than fans hoped, but it does seem that Sony is still determined to make the third film happen. Unless we hear otherwise, we’ve got Bad Boys for Life on our calendars for its opening day, January 17, 2020.
