It’s being reported that Christopher McQuarrie has been hired to write the screenplay for the sequel this year’s X-Men Origins: Wolverine. The project is currently being developed by Hugh Jackman, and as expected, it will be taking the temperamental bladed mutant off to Japan.

The movie has always been expected to follow the Samurai storyline that Wolverine embarked on, but the pitch that McQuarrie made was likely the best take on that particular storyline. The tale would be based on the Frank Miller and Chris Claremont story, The Samurai, in which Wolverine goes to Japan and trains as a Samurai while also working on his anger issues.

Christopher McQuarrie is an interesting choice for the job; he won an Oscar for Best Original Screenplay for The Usual Suspects, which Bryan Singer directed. He then helped Singer on the original X-Men before moving on to write Singer’s Valkyrie. No word on who might direct the sequel, though fans would love to see Singer himself jump back in and take this one. But with the announcement that he’s doing a Battlestar Galactica movie, it seems pretty unlikely, though he hasn’t completely ruled out returning to the X-Men universe. There’s always the chance of the first movie’s director Gavin Hood returning, as well.

[Source: Variety]