Tobey Maguire is joining the cast of The Crusaders a film about the 1954 Brown versus the Board of Education court battle…

Djimon Hounsou is starring in a Conan the Barbarian spin off as Thulsa Doom…

Tobey Maguire is set to play Jack Greenberg, a lawyer who is not long out of law school and joins the team that managed to win a landmark Supreme Court case that ruled that segregation in American schools was illegal.

Gary Ross of Seabiscuit is directing The Crusaders and the Recount writer Danny Strong is to develop the script according to Variety through Coming Soon.

This marks another forward move for Maguire in his career, and another step away from Spider-Man. I doubt we'll ever see him return to that role again.

Interestingly IMDB had Greenberg, who wrote the book on which the film is based, as being played by Topher Grace and Alex Graves directing.

Djimon Hounsou is to play the role that James Earl Jones played in the film version of Conan the Barbarian but this time it won't be a Conan film but one that's entirely his own. Thulsa Doom is the character who will be getting his own film according to Variety through Coming Soon.

The film will show the origins of the character and show how his intentions were originally good but caused a complete downward spiral of his life.

This starring role for Hounsou is good news for his career, grabbing the lead of a film, and it's something he really does deserve as he carries with him bags of acting talent. However I wonder if the role is playing to strengths other than his acting, his notoriety and physique for example, and I can't help but think that his talents could be missed out here for a script of fighting and flexing.

It does suggest that if the character is going to appear in a new Conan film then he'll be the first choice.