The long-gestating Battlestar Galactica movie is moving ahead, with Red Sparrow and Hunger Games director Francis Lawrence attached to helm the project.

While it may be a while until it actually reaches the screen, Lawrence has teased a few details, including the idea of gender-swapped characters.

"Yeah we're still working on that," he told Digital Spy. "I've been developing that for a while. I've been working with Lisa Joy who's been fantastic, she's one of the creators of Westworld and she's been doing a fantastic job.

Related: New Westworld photos tease unlikely character crossovers as stars promise season 2 is "nuts"

"It's taken a while because she's done two seasons of Westworld while writing this and I've been making Red Sparrow while working on this so it's been a while."

Expanding on what form it will take, Lawrence clarified: "Yes it's a reimagining, it's not a continuation of the series, it's a standalone piece."

Given the increasing and long overdue diversity of representation on screen and the TV series' tendency for gender switching, could the movie live up to that?

"Yes absolutely 100 per cent!" he continued. "I'm not going to give any details but 100% there's room for that." We'll hold him to that.

SyFy

Related: Red Sparrow director was "honestly panicked" about giving Jennifer Lawrence the script because of the nudity

Westworld's Joy is set to write the script for the movie, which is set to be produced by Bluegrass Films and Michael De Luca Productions.

Red Sparrow is out now.

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