Ben Foster set to join Tom Hanks in Ron Howard’s adaptation of Inferno

I’ll get this right out of the way; I’m a fan of Ron Howard’s ridiculous Robert Langdon films based on the books by Dan Brown. Sure they’re completely absurd and you feel a little dirty at the end but dammit, they’re a lot of fun and having Tom Hanks around certainly gives them a bit of much needed credibility.

Ben Foster has just signed on to the latest film in the Robert Langdon series, INFERNO, which already counts Tom Hanks, Felicity Jones, Omar Sy, Sidse Babett Knudsen, and Irrfan Khan among the cast. Foster will play a brilliant scientist obsessed with Dante’s Inferno who dreams up a plot to solve the overpopulation crisis by releasing a virus. In the novel he goes by the name of Bertrand Zobrist; looking forward to hearing Hanks chew his way through that moniker.

INFERNO continues the story of Dr. Robert Langdon as he finds himself in an Italian hospital suffering from amnesia. He teams up with Dr. Sienna Brooks (Felicity Jones) who he hopes can help him regain his memories as well as deal with a certain madman wanting to unleash a global plague.

The previous two films in the series, THE DA VINCI CODE and ANGELS & DEMONS, both did fairly well at the box office despite receiving a predominantly negative critical response. Ron Howard helmed both films and he’ll be back again for INFERNO. Production is said to get underway this April with an October 14, 2016 release.

Ever since Ben Foster poped up in Six Feet Under years ago I've enjoyed following his career but kept wondering why he wasn't a bigger star; however with both INFERNO and WARCRAFT popping up in 2016, I have a feeling we'll be hearing his name a lot more.