During press for The Bourne Ultimatum, Matt Damon and director Paul Greengrass repeatly stated that this would be the last Bourne movie, at least for quite some time. Damon said that the character had been played out, and the only way to do a sequel would be to wait like ten years in order to get a different angle on him.

Then, like we all half-expected, there was an easy-to-miss blurb in one of the trades late last year that Universal had convinced Damon and Greengrass to return for a fourth flick to be released as early as 2010. So, y'know...just kidding about all that "give the character a rest" thing.

No other news has surfaced on it, however, until now. At the Saturn Awards on Tuesday, producer Frank Marshall said that the current plan is to start shooting Summer 2009 for a Summer 2010 release. Robert Ludlum only wrote three Bourne novels, and although somebody else wrote a fourth, they'll probably go in their own direction, which might take Bourne down to South America.

As for Greengrass and Damon? They're remaining mum for now, probably because publicly eating crow isn't something most people enjoy doing. Then again, maybe all that "this is the last one" talk was just some backhanded bargaining for bigger salaries.

One piece of advice to the filmmakers: don't screw up the impeccable alphabetization of the series. Identity, Supremacy, and Ultimatum are all in alphabetical as well as chronological order. So the noun following "The Bourne" in the fourth film has to start with one of the last five letters of the alphabet.

I swear I'm not obsessive compulsive. ❏