Game on, man! With the Training Day TV version looking to switch the ethnicities of the two main roles, the team needed someone who could play a tough lead cop. They've now chosen Bill Paxton, who will be a morally questionable LAPD officer.
Paxton is on to play Franke Rourke, a veteran cop heading up the Special Investigation Section that goes after the worst of the worst of the criminals in the City of Angels. He's more than willing to bend or even break the rules to take down the bad guys that the law seemingly can't touch. The new series, which is set 15 years after Antoine Fuqua's film, will look at LAPD policing the way it is now, as an idealistic young African-American officer joins the squad, but begins to have doubts over Rourke's methods.
Though Fuqua had been in line to direct the pilot based on Will Beall's script, he's had to step aside due to scheduling issues, so Danny Cannon, a veteran of launching shows such as the CSI series, will take his place. And despite both the film's writer and basic concept, the series will have to go some to establish itself as original in a world where The Shield, which covered similar territory, exists. Still, Paxton's presence is a reason for hope.