‘The Equalizer’ May Reunite ‘Training Day’ Team Of Denzel Washington, Antoine Fuqua

The Equalizer, and Denzel Washington, fans may be beaming after a Thursday report from Deadline that former Training Day director Antoine Fuqua could be reuniting with Washington for a film update of the 1980s TV drama.

Fuqua was said to be in “early talks” for taking over the project, which has faced many challenges in finding a director despite Washington’s enthusiasm for the project.

In January 2013, Nicolas Winding Refn (Drive) pulled out. Rupert Wyatt (Rise of the Planet of the Apes) followed earlier this month.

Fuqua, however, could be the late gift this project needs to revitalize The Equalizer film adaptation since he and Washington have been looking for another collaboration since their Award-winning turn in Training Day.

Since that effort in which Fuqua directed Washington to an Academy Award for Best Actor, the filmmaker has continued churning out films with the grit and brutality this project would need to work.

Fuqua’s latest effort, Olympus Has Fallen, promises to be an equally dark, bleak, and violent, feature.

The Washington Post said the film had “a no-holds barred approach,” adding that “tourists are shot with machine guns, bombs go off at will, and the Washington monument is toppled.”

Star Angela Bassett, herself an Oscar nominee, insisted that Fuqua had a knack for keeping things from crossing over into the gratuitous and praised the opportunity to work with Fuqua as well as his unique vision.

“Even the screenwriters, I was just with them the last couple of days, even they admitted that, you know, they wrote it [Olympus Has Fallen], but still it was realized in a completely different way than they saw in their own heads.”

The Equalizer will focus on Robert McCall (Washington, but originally played by Edward Woodward), who is a retired intelligence agent working as a private detective to even the odds for troubled clients.

The series ran from 1985 to 1989 for a total of four seasons and 88 episodes. Deadline noted that should the adaptation come to fruition, it will be a planned franchise for Washington — the first of his career.

In other words, expect a lot more from the new Robert McCall if only the first film can get made.

Are you excited about The Equalizer and a possible reunion of Denzel Washington and his Training Day director?