The cast of Bad Boys 4 continues to grow, as it's now been revealed that Ioan Gruffudd has boarded the cast in a key role. Plot details on the sequel are still scarce, though the movie will notably bring back Martin Lawrence and Will Smith as the detectives who think of themselves as the titular "Bad Boys." Deadline reports that Gruffudd will play the role of Lockwood, a "high-profile attorney running for election." Whether he will serve as a friend to Lawrence's Marcus Burnett and Smith's Mike Lowrey remains to be seen,
It was previously reported that the fourth installment of the Bad Boys franchise will also be bringing back Bad Boys for Life stars Paola Nunez, Alexander Ludwig, and Vanessa Hudgens. Euphoria and Grey's Anatomy star Eric Dane has also reportedly been brought in to play the villain. Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah are directing, coming back after helming Bad Boys for Life, while the script comes from Chris Bremner. Jerry Bruckheimer is producing with Smith and Doug Belgrad, while Lawrence is executive producing with James Lassiter, Chad Oman, Mike Stenson, Barry Waldman, and Jon Mone.
Given the popularity of superhero movies, Gruffudd is very well known for his role as Reed Richards, aka Mister Fantastic, in the live-action Fantastic Four movie released in 2005. He would later reprise the role for the sequel, Fantastid Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer, in 2007. The actor has since appeared in films like Horrible Bosses, San Andreas, The Professor and the Madman, and Ava. He has also had lead roles on the small screen in recent years sor shows like Forever, Liar, Harrow, and The Reunion.
The Bad Boys Are Back
All three installments of the Bad Boys trilogy were big hitters at the box office. Released in 2020, Bad Boys for Life proved how lucrative the franchise can still be by grossing over $426 million on a budget of less than $100 million. Now that movies like Top Gun: Maverick and The Super Mario Bros. Movie are showing that films are back to making very big bucks in theaters following the pandemic era, it seems to be a good time to come back out with the next installment of the series. Lawrence has even teased that this will be the best one yet.
"It has the chance to be the best one of them all and everybody's doing their thing," the actor told Entertainment Tonight. "We got a lot of the team back from the last one. Big Willie's doing his thing as always and so focused and, yeah, it has the chance to be the biggest one."
There had been rumors that the project would be canceled last year after Smith's incident at the Oscars. At this point, however, the controversy has died down substantially, though Smith is still not without his critics. It remains to be seen if that backlash will affect the movie's box office performance, though there has noticably been a great deal of excitement from fans thus far with the news about the movie getting made.
Bad Boys 4 does not yet have a release date set.