by: S. Scott Stanikmas – Senior Staff Writer

Elizabeth Banks is about to show us it’s good to be bad.

The actress / producer / director has decided that for her next role she’s going to play a major villain. The Hollywood Reporter has the news that Banks has signed on to play alien witch Rita Repulsa in Lionsgate’s big-screen adaptation of Power Rangers.

Banks had a huge 2015. Her directorial debut with Pitch Perfect 2 did really good at the box office and she reprised her role of Effie Trinket in the final Hunger Games installment, Mockingjay Part 2.

The film will take a new group of teenagers – RJ Cyler. Becky G, Dacre Montgomery, Ludi Lin and Naomi Scott – and give them the colorful costumes and dinosaur robots that will help them attempt to stop Rita Repulsa and her plot to take over Earth.

Project Almanac director Dean Israelite is directing from a script by Matt Sazama and Burk Sharpless. The duo of Sazama and Sharpless don’t exactly inspire a lot of faith, with their past efforts totaling Dracula Untold, The Last Witch Hunter and the upcoming (and utterly cheesy looking) Gods of Egypt.

But this is a cheesy franchise which many will look at through those rose-colored glasses that will allow them to just turn off their brains and enjoy a hokey film.

Power Rangers is currently on the schedule for March 2017.