Actor-turned-director Andy Serkis will be taking on his first comic book movie as a filmmaker.

Serkis closed the deal with Sony Pictures to direct the sequel to 2018’s Venom starring Tom Hardy. The anti-hero flick raked in USD 856 million in the worldwide box office. Hardy will be reprising his role as Eddie Brock, the journalist who becomes host to the alien symbiote, Venom.

The director flew to Los Angeles, California in July to strike a deal with Sony brass on the project. The Hollywood Reporter reports that several directors were circling the job. Venom 2 will be Serkis’ third directorial film after Breathe (2017) and Netflix’ Mowgli: Legend of the Jungle backed by Warner Bros.

For cinephiles out there Serkis is best known for his role as Gollum in the Lord of the Rings trilogy. That’s right, it was him behind the motion-capture and performance-capture work behind the iconic character from 2002 to 2004. Serkis then dabbled into second unit directing as he teamed up with Peter Jackson for the Hobbit trilogy from 2012 to 2014. He returned to acting playing villains in the recent Star Wars films and in Marvel’s Black Panther.

His expertise in handling CGI and performance-capture tech is the advantage that landed him the Venom sequel according to THR.

The script from Venom 2 is penned by Kelly Marcel. The original 2018 film was helmed by Ruben Fleischer and starred actress Michelle Williams opposite, Hardy. It featured a last-minute cameo from actor Woody Harrelson who Serkis worked with on War for the Planet of the Apes (2017).