It’s the end of the road for The Equalizer. The third film in the Denzel Washington franchise hits theaters this weekend, and we’re told it’ll be the last. So why is now the right time to say goodbye?

“We’ve done as much as we can do with McCall, I believe, up to this point, right?” Director Antoine Fuqua tells ABC Audio. “The first one is finding his purpose. The second one is making peace with the past. This one is just finding a place and finding a home. And I think he’s done that in this film. And so from that point I believe let Robert McCall sail off into the Mediterranean, you know, and have a little peace for a while.”

It’s a journey to get to that peace, though. Fuqua says, “It starts off, he’s in a darker place.”

“And so you have to see him go through a physical and mental journey to get back to himself,” he adds. “And so I think that at some point, where else do you go? You know, what else do you do?”

Even with this being the third film in The Equalizer trilogy, Fuqua shares that the theme of all three can be wrapped up in one word: Justice. 

“You know the best of us. It seems that what people walk away with is that we all want justice more than money and fame or anything else. People want justice. And I think that’s very important,” he says.

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