Universal has found a director for its forthcoming reboot of The Mummy, with THR reporting that Alex Kurtzman will be the man to take the helm. We recently brought you news that Kurtzman and new writing partner Chris Morgan had been charged by the studio with creating a new crossover universe linking all its classic monster franchises, with The Mummy set to be first out of the gate. Now it appears that Kurtzman’s duties will extend beyond sketching the overall template for said universe, with THR claiming he is in the final stage of negotiations to direct that first film.

Last month we got the utterly fantastic news that Rian Johnson will be writing and directing Star Wars: Episode VIII, (in addition to crafting a treatment for Star Wars: Episode IX).  Johnson’s Looper is such an incredibly strong film that I have to imagine there will be a certain amount of quality gained from this if he’s allowed a reasonable amount of control over the project.  While details are still thin on Episode VIII (let’s face it, they’re still thin on Episode VII so I wouldn’t expect this to get better anytime soon) this is a sign that Lucasfilm and Disney are at least somewhat conce