Antoine Fuqua leaves the door open for another Equalizer, if Denzel Washington is down

“Listen, Denzel’s in shape. He’s training every day,” Fuqua continued. “If you saw him now, it would blow your mind. He’s like 60 pounds lighter, even from The Equalizer. He’s really healthy. Yeah, it’s up to him. Obviously, if he wanted to do another one, I would as well, but I don’t see it. But who knows?”

While this glimmer of hope may be exciting for fans of the gritty franchise, Fuqua did seem to effectively shut this door in an interview with Total Film earlier this month. “I don’t see another one in it for me,” the director said. “From my conversations with Denzel, this is the final one [for him] as well.” (We also feel the need to point out that the trailer for The Equalizer 3 refers to the film as “the final chapter,” but, again, “who knows?”)

However, in the words of The A.V. Club reviewer Timothy Cogshell, “One can expect more equalizing in the future due to the strength of the context of these films.”

“Rumor has it that John David Washington (Denzel’s movie-star son) may be cued up for the role in a prequel,” Cogshell continues. “Perhaps we’ll get to see where his sense of brutal righteousness comes from. And maybe we’ll even get another three satisfying movies out of it.”