(Credit: Netflix)

Tom Hardy has been announced as the lead star in the upcoming Netflix action-thriller Havoc. The film follows a weathered detective who ventures through the criminal underworld to rescue a politician’s estranged son after a drug deal gone wrong. As his journey continues, he finds himself entangled in the corruption and conspiracy that lies beneath it all.

Hardy stars in Havoc alongside Jessie Mei Li, Justin Cornwell, Quelin Sepulveda, Luis Guzmán, Michelle Waterson, Sunny Pang, Jim Caesar, Xelia Mendes-Jones with Yeo Yann Yann, Timothy Olyphant, and Forest Whitaker.

Gareth Evans is the director behind the project, best known for The Raid and Gangs of London, but it will be his first directorial feature since the 2018 film Gothic. The director rose to fame in 2011 with The Raid, which was one of the breakout action movies of the decade. The film was produced by Evans, Ed Talfan, Aram Tertzakian and also Hardy.

The project has been a long wait, with most of the principal photography and shooting taking place between July and October 2021. However, the film required additional shooting, which meant the release date was pushed back as the production team struggled to find availability in the actors’ schedules to reshoot.

Despite the three-year delay, Hardy has assured fans that the project will be worth the delay, saying the extra shooting period “had a profound effect on the film.” He continued: “It allowed me to better streamline it and make it what it was always intended to be, which is a blistering, fast-paced action-thriller with nods to the Hong Kong cinema that I grew up watching.”

The production team expanded on this by describing the action sequences in the film, saying, “That’s the primary focus. But with Tom, what you get as well is an intensely muscular central performance, and really well-developed character. There’s a lot going on under the hood.”

Hardy recently starred in Venom: The Last Dance, the final instalment of the Marvel series about the classic comic-book villain. Hardy has made a name for himself with films of this genre, also starring in The Revenant, Mad Max Fury Road, and many of Christopher Nolan’s films, such as Inception, Dunkirk, and The Dark Knight Rises. Earlier this year, the actor also starred in The Bikeriders, which was based on a true story and directed by Jeff Nichols.

Havoc is set to be released in early 2025.