With a few box office duds in the past couple of years, sequels for “Pirates of the Caribbean” and “Alice in Wonderland” are still a year or two away for Johnny Depp’s career revival.

In the meantime, Warner Brothers presented director Scott Cooper’s “Black Mass,” which may place Depp back in the spotlight.

At CinemaCon this week, Cooper presented a short clip of the upcoming crime drama in which Johnny Depp plays the notorious criminal Whitey Bulger.

The actor was absent, but director Cooper was there for the presentation to thousands of attendees.

In the clip, Depp nearly looks unrecognizable as the aged, white-haired and gaunt Whitey Bulger. The clip shows the interaction with FBI supervisor John Morris (played by David Harbour), in which he teased him over revealing a family secret recipe as a betrayal of trust.

The intense scene is followed by a quick montage of quick scenes and sometimes violent that included Benedict Cumberbatch as Billy Bulger and Joel Edgerton as FBI agent John Connelly.

The story looks into Bulger who became an FBI informant to take down a Mafia family invading his turf.

If the short trailer is any indication, many people will notice a very different Depp from his characters in the past years.

“Black Mass” will be in theaters on September 18.