Knives Out sequel lands Guardians of the Galaxy star

Guardians of the Galaxy star Dave Bautista has been cast in the sequel to all-conquering whodunnit Knives Out. Variety reports that he’ll act opposite Daniel Craig’s super-sleuth Benoit Blanc in the movie, though his role is as-yet-unspecified. 

It’ll be the second time Bautista has appeared in a Daniel Craig flick, with the wrestler-turned-actor playing hench henchman Hinx in 2015 James Bond movie Spectre.

The first Knives Out – which starred the likes of Jamie Lee Curtis, Chris Evans, Ana de Armas Don Johnson, Toni Collette and Christopher Plummer – was a critical and commercial hit, making more than $300m at the global box office, landing a 97% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, and receiving an Academy Award nomination for Best Original Screenplay.

Since the film was released in 2019, writer-director Rian Johnson has spoken about his interest in telling more Benoit Blanc stories, and the potential for a franchise clearly interested Netflix, as the streaming service spent a reported $468m on the series in March.
That bought them Knives Out 2 and 3, with the first flick set to shoot in Greece this summer.

Bautista made the move from wrestling to acting via action flicks, before landing the role of Drax the Destroyer in Marvel movie Guardians of the Galaxy. He’s since appeared in the likes of Blade Runner 2049, Hotel Artemis, and the concluding Avengers films, while he’ll next be seen in Army of the Dead, the Zack Snyder zombie-horror that hits Netflix later this month.