filThere’s an interesting new rumor about what’s coming up next for the upcoming Street Fighter movie, and it’s definitely not what any of us expected.
As shared by Culture Crave on Twitter, Jeff Sneider reported in The Insneider that Fallout star Walton Goggins is in talks to play the franchise’s biggest villain, the dictator of Shadaloo, M. Bison. The last time we reported on this project, other big stars like Andrew Koji, Jason Momoa, Noah Centineo, and Roman Reigns were being talked about to take roles in this movie, though nothing has been officially confirmed.
If the rumor is true, it will be an interesting choice for Goggins, who certainly hasn’t shied away from character actor work in his career. Gamers may know him now for his memorable turn as the Ghoul in the Amazon Fallout show, and more mainstream audiences are still reeling over his controversial and somewhat emotional run in the latest season of The White Lotus, Goggins played many memorable side characters over the course of his career, on his path to becoming a bankable star in his own right.
As a small sample of these sometimes quirky, sometimes memorable little Hollywood credits, he was Wallace, a minor villain in Shanghai Noon, Sonny Burch, a minor villain in Ant-Man and The Wasp, a Research Tech in The Bourne Identity, and Oliver, and a jealous boyfriend in an episode of The Big Bang Theory.
M. Bison also has a surprisingly interesting history in Hollywood of his own. Famously, he was played by Puerto Rican legend Raúl Juliá in Capcom’s campy 1994 live action Street Fighter movie. Veteran star Neal McDonough of Desperate Housewives and Band of Brothers fame then played him in the considerably less poorly received 2009 film Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li. While Street Fighter hasn’t quite become a crossover box office film franchise, Capcom has certainly pulled out all the stops to make sure their resident dictator gets top tier casting.
Goggins could bring an unpredictable energy to his depiction of general Bison, as he is wont to take even the most ridiculous and camp roles with earnest. Once again, as fans of Fallout already know, he took a character that was clearly created to be hated in the video games and imbued him with real, in unexpected, heart.
While producer Legendary Pictures took back the planned release date of March 20, 2026, it’s clear that the wheels are set in motion to produce and finish this film. We’re certainly looking forward to finding out the final cast we will get for the Street Fighter movie.
