Star Trek Into Darkness star Benedict Cumberbatch has joined Warner Bros. competing Jungle Book film.
Cumberbatch will take on the role of the villainous tiger Shere Khan, who is more than eager to kill Mowgli, according to The Hollywood Reporter, who first learned of the casting.
The veteran British actor is the first to officially join the project, which has motion-capture savant Ander Serkis on board to make his directorial debut. Steve Kloves is producing, while the script was written by his daughter Callie Kloves.
Cumberbatch mostly recently voiced Smaug in Peter Jackson's overly long The Hobbit: Desolation of Smaug. He is nominated for an Emmy award for Sherlock and will next be in theaters for the Alan Turing biopic The Imitation Game.
Jungle Book: Origins is slated to hit theaters Oct. 21, 2016, little more than a year after Disney's planned adaptation of the Rudyard Kipling tales. Fellow British actor Idris Elba is on board to voice Shere Khan for Disney.
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