Benicio Del Toro and Josh Brolin go to war in the Sicario: Day of the Soldado. The sequel to Denis Villeneuve's celebrated crime drama sees Stefano Sollima (Gomorrah) stepping behind the camera as director with original screenwriter Taylor Sheridan -- who also wrote Hell or High Water and helmed last year's Wind River -- returning to pen the script.

USA Today debuted a new trailer and revealed new plot details for the sequel, which finds the drug war on the US-Mexico border escalated when the cartels start sending terrorists over the border, The film picks up with Del Toro's revenge-fuelled Alejandro when he's “hired again by CIA operative Matt Graver (Brolin) to start a war between dueling cartels by kidnapping Isabela Reyes (Isabela Moner), the teenage daughter of infamous kingpin Carlos Reyes. When the mission is exposed, and Graver orders Alejandro to terminate Isabela, the killer’s cold façade cracks.”

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Image via Sony Pictures

Despite being an action-oriented crime thriller, Sicario was very much an intimate film and when we previously spoke with Sheridan, the writer assured us that the sequel will maintain that emotional throughline while delivering bigger, "more severe" stakes.

“I think it’s just more severe, man. All the way around. I think the characters are more severe. I think the movie is more severe. I think it’s just much bigger. It’s just a bigger scope film. Like I said, when I saw it it was like Sicario felt like a small movie to me, even though it was a very intimate movie. I’ve always said I don’t understand why bigger movies can’t be just as intimate, if not more intimate. Why do they have to be less emotional? I think Soldado‘s a perfect example of that. I think it’s extremely emotional. I think it’s extremely tense and it deals with similar subject matters.”

Watch the first Sicario: Day of the Soldado trailer below, along with a new set of photos. The film also stars Catherine Keener and Matthew Modine and opens in theaters on June 29, 2018.

Here's the official synopsis for Sicario: Day of the Soldado:

"In Sicario: Day of the Soldado, the drug war on the US – Mexico border has escalated as the cartels have begun trafficking terrorists across the US border. To fight the war, federal agent Matt Graver (Josh Brolin) reteams with the mercurial Alejandro (Benicio Del Toro)."

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Image via Sony PIctures
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Image via Sony PIctures
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Image via Sony PIctures
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Image via Sony PIctures