CBS has had good luck rebooting series from the pasts with Hawaii Five-0, Macgyver & Magnum P.I. all pulling in decent numbers. The network is looking to continue that trend with a reboot of its 1980s series, The Equalizer, with Queen Latifah set to play the lead role.
The project comes from Castle creator Andrew Marlowe and it has received a pilot production commitment at the network. What that essentially means is that the pilot will definitely move forward and if the network chooses to pass on the project, they’ll have to pay a penalty for not taking it to series. Pilot commitments usually show early confidence in a project and usually means the pilot will go to series if the network is happy with the outcome.
The new series will stick close to the premise of the original, with Queen Latifah playing an enigmatic woman who uses her extensive skills to help people who have nowhere else to turn. Of course, the lead role is now gender-flipped since Edward Woodward played the role on the series which ran from 1985-1989. Denzel Washington also played the role in two successful films based on the series.
