Nowadays, the thought of a major movie star appearing in an ongoing TV show or limited series doesn’t seem strange. We’re currently living in a time when Tom Hanks will make a cameo appearance in 1883, Gary Oldman will star as the lead of his own Apple TV+ drama, and Oscar winners like Michelle Yeoh and Jessica Chastain will regularly appear in their own streaming shows. Ten years ago, though, the line between TV and film wasn’t one that was routinely crossed by movie stars.

That all changed when True Detective premiered on HBO in 2014. The show’s first season, led by Woody Harrelson and Matthew McConaughey, debuted when the latter was in the midst of an Oscar campaign that would prove successful less than two full months later. Outside of a few cameo appearances on Eastbound & Down, True Detective marked the first TV show that McConaughey had ever starred in, and it was the first in nearly 15 years that Harrelson had worked on. McConaughey’s participation in True Detective, in particular, made an impact that cannot be overstated.

David Ayer is out of his element.

While the director might be best known by some as the director of DC’s infamous supervillain movie The Suicide Squad, Ayer feels more comfortable writing and directing gritty crime thrillers like Training Day. With his latest movie, The Beekeeper, he’s treading new waters again with a gonzo action flick starring tough-guy actor Jason Statham and his legendary Cockney growl.

Inverse caught up with Ayer and actor Josh Hutcherson, who plays The Beekeeper’s extremely punchable millennial villain, to unpack the meaning behind the movie and what comes next.