Update 01/14/2022: Justified has been confirmed to return as a new limited series on FX, subtitled City Primeval. Timothy Olyphant will return to play US Marshal Raylan Givens.
Per THR, will indeed be based on Elmore Leonard’s City Primeval: High Noon in Detroit. Original showrunner Graham Yost will serve as executive producer, with Dave Andron and Michael Dinner as new co-showrunners – Dinner will also direct the series.
A description of the storyline reads: "Having left the hollers of Kentucky eight years ago, Raylan Givens now lives in Miami, a walking anachronism balancing his life as a U.S. Marshal and part-time father of a 14-year-old girl. His hair is grayer, his hat is dirtier, and the road in front of him is suddenly a lot shorter than the road behind. A chance encounter on a desolate Florida highway sends him to Detroit. There he crosses paths with Clement Mansell, aka The Oklahoma Wildman, a violent, sociopathic desperado who’s already slipped through the fingers of Detroit’s finest once and aims to do so again. Mansell’s lawyer, formidable Motor City native Carolyn Wilder, has every intention of representing her client, even as she finds herself caught in between cop and criminal, with her own game afoot as well. These three characters set out on a collision course in classic Elmore Leonard fashion, to see who makes it out of the City Primeval alive.”
The team behind Justified is reportedly developing a new TV series that could bring back actor Timothy Olyphant as Raylan Givens.
Variety reports that the series would be based on the book City Primeval: High Noon in Detroit. The show is reportedly in early development, and no deal has been reached with Olyphant.
The character Raylan Givens is not the main star of the book City Primeval and doesn't appear to be in the book at all. However, City Primeval's author, Elmore Leonard, created the Raylan Givens character for other stories before the character appeared on Justified.
Justified featured U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens, who is assigned to his hometown in Kentucky after a controversy cost Givens his last station in Florida. The City Primeval novel is about a different detective in Detroit, Michigan trying to take down a serial killer who keeps getting away with his crimes.
Justified ran from 2010 to 2015 and featured Olyphant in every episode. The creator of Justified, Graham Yost, will executive produce City Primeval. The showrunners for City Primeval will be Michael Dinner and Dave Andron, who were executive producers and writers on Justified. Dinner will direct for the series as well.
City Primeval is in development at FX, which is the same network that broadcast Justified. All episodes of Justified are currently available to stream on Hulu in the USA.
Olyphant recently showed up in the first episode of season 2 of The Mandalorian and acted alongside Chris Rock in Fargo season 4. Olyphant and Rock will next appear in David O. Russell's upcoming movie with Anya Taylor-Joy, Christian Bale, Mike Myers, and Margot Robbie.
IGN revisited Justified as part of our Binge It! series. We said, "Justified boasts a spectacular roster of character actors as both allies and antagonists, and every season is buoyed by the strength of its villains."
Justified also made our list of the best TV shows of the decade.
Petey Oneto is a freelance writer for IGN.
