It has been a while since James Gunn took control of the DCU, and his soft rebooted version of the respective super-verse seems to be unfolding pretty epically already. For one, his action series Creature Commandos fared perfectly well with fans and critics worldwide, and his upcoming project Lanterns is expected to follow suit.
But wait: Although it is not known yet if this forthcoming television series based on different Green Lantern characters from DC Comics will be good enough or not, Rami Malek’s The Amateur just might help with that, since it has been tamed by none other than the very director who is also involved with the DC show: James Hawes.
The Amateur director has also worked on James Gunn’s Lanterns
Rami Malek and Rachel Brosnahan left no stone unturned when they showed up on the screens together in their thriller-action film released earlier this year, The Amateur. From a script written by Ken Nolan and Gary Spinelli and based on the 1981 novel of the same name by Robert Littell, it was helmed by British director James Hawes.
Encircling the life of brilliant CIA decoder Charlie Heller (played by Malek), it saw his world come crashing down when his wife (played by Brosnahan) was killed in a terrorist attack in London.
But his supervisors refuse to take action on the same, so Charlie takes matters into his own hands. Making his intelligence his ultimate weapon, he embarks on a dangerous mission to track down those responsible from across the globe.
The movie was recently released for streaming on Amazon Prime Video, Apple TV, and Sky Store at Home, available to be rented and/or bought. But the surprising part is that it was actually helmed by the very director who was also hired to direct two episodes of Lanterns!
James Hawes’ work on this flick hints at how good Lanterns might be
Made on a production budget of $60 million, the movie snatched $95.8 million from box offices worldwide (per The Numbers). While that feat’s not all that profitable or commendable, the reception and reviews of The Amateur from fans and critics worldwide ostensibly speak volumes about how epic of a job James Hawes did on the flick.
According to the reviews on Rotten Tomatoes, the movie currently stands at a sweet 88% approval score from general audiences opposite a 61% score from critics — mixed reviews from critics, yes, but the flick is pretty praiseworthy considering the positive reviews that deemed it to be among the range of “an aggressively competent spy thriller” (per IndieWire).
Not to mention, he also holds some fair title credits up his sleeve, like One Life (2023) and The Challenger Disaster (2013). Judging from all of this, it’s more than just evident that James Hawes knows how to tame his action-thriller fair enough to captivate and please his audiences, though not everyone might agree with his perspective.
At the same time, to land the final verdict of how James Gunn‘s upcoming series Lanterns will fare with critics and fans based on these would be too early to say. That said, for now, fans might as well just watch the movie and decide for themselves if they like Hawes’ style or not, letting it serve as a litmus test for the forthcoming DCU TV series.
The Amateur can currently be rented on Apple TV, while Lanterns is set to premiere on HBO in early 2026.
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