With his film career in the last few years and his stint on 30 Rock, James Marsden has proved he’s got plenty of comic chops. He’ll need all of them (and a couple of ribs) when he enters the potential thunderdome of improv and surreal madness that will surely result in Anchorman: The Legend Continues.

Co-writer/director Adam McKay has talked before of his hope to pluck from a raft of comedy friends to populate the sequel, and the pluckening has begun in earnest with Kristen Wiig signing on earlier this month.

Marsden is on to play a rival news anchor that becomes Ron Burgundy (Will Ferrell)’s nemesis. And if we know anything about how Ron deals with enemies, we get the feeling another royal rumble could be in the offing.

Ferrell, who has co-written the script, is set to report to Atlanta next month to kick off shooting alongside fellow veterans Steve Carell, Paul Rudd, Christina Applegate and David Koechner.

As for Marsden, he’ll be back in a more dramatic mood for his next appearances inDenzel Washington/Mark Wahlberg action thriller 2 Guns and Lee Daniels' historical biopic The Butler. And he'll blend both for Robot & Frank, which arrives on March 8. But if we’re honest, now we’re mostly just excited to see him tangling with the world’s finest news team…