Cocaine Bear director Elizabeth Banks is down to make Cocaine Shark

Cocaine Bear will be roaring into theaters in just two weeks, but could Cocaine Shark be far behind?

The upcoming action comedy is based on real events, in which a black bear died after eating a shipment of cocaine that has been dropped out of a plane by a smuggler. After it was reported that the New Zealand police had recovered more than three tons of cocaine floating in the Pacific Ocean, Cocaine Shark began trending on Twitter. While speaking with People, Cocaine Bear director Elizabeth Banks said that she was aware of the news, as well as the demand for a Cocaine Shark follow-up. “I’ve seen that. If there’s a great story, then sure,” Banks said. “Jaws with cocaine, I don’t see how that loses.” And just like that, the unlikely animals on cocaine franchise was born.

The first trailer for Cocaine Bear certainly exceeded my expectations. It looks like a wild time, and Elizabeth Banks said that she “definitely didn’t shy away from” making the film a gory experience. “In my initial presentation [I] brought to the table a lot of really gruesome real life photography of people who have had limbs ripped off and things like that, and giant gashes and bites,” Banks said. “And [I] just sort of said, ‘I want this…’ I wanted The Revenant.“

While the movie plays it fast and loose with the facts, the true story is just as compelling. In 1985, convicted drug smuggler Andrew Thornton was on a smuggling run from Columbia and had dumped several packages full of cocaine before bailing from the plane himself. Unfortunately, he hit his head on the tail of the aircraft and wound up in a free fall to the ground, where he was found dead in someone’s driveway. Several months later, a 175-pound black bear was found dead after devouring approximately $15 million worth of cocaine that Thornton had dropped. “Its stomach was literally packed to the brim with cocaine,” the medical examiner who’d performed the bear’s necropsy said. “There isn’t a mammal on the planet that could survive that. Cerebral hemorrhaging, respiratory failure, hyperthermia, renal failure, heart failure, stroke. You name it, that bear had it.“

Cocaine Bear will hit theaters on February 24th. Would you like to see a Cocaine Shark movie? Followed by Cocaine Giraffe, Cocaine Hamster, and maybe even Cocaine Sharktopus.