Edward Norton to play The Bourne Legacys villain?

Edward Norton is close to signing on to play the villain in The Bourne Legacy .

Variety report that the former Hulk actor is in negotiations for the mysterious role.

If Norton signs on the dotted line, he’ll be going up against new franchise lead Jeremy Renner, who’s taking on the hero role in the Matt Damon-lite system reset.

Directed by Tony Gilroy, Legacy will also star the recently married Rachel Weisz, and takes place in the same world as the previous Bourne films – albeit minus their titular hero.

It’s been a while since Norton did something that not only capitalised on his considerable ability to play a total bastard, but also got our blood seriously pumping.

Legacy promises to do both those things, and for that it gets a round of applause.

The Bourne Legacy opens 3 August 2012.

Josh Winning has worn a lot of hats over the years. Contributing Editor at Total Film, writer for SFX, and senior film writer at the Radio Times. Josh has also penned a novel about mysteries and monsters, is the co-host of a movie podcast, and has a library of pretty phenomenal stories from visiting some of the biggest TV and film sets in the world. He would also like you to know that he "lives for cat videos..." Don't we all, Josh. Don't we all.