As insane as it is to think that it's already been nearly ten years since the release of the horror/comedy ZOMBIELAND, it's almost just as insane to realize that there is still some life left in the idea of getting a ZOMBIELAND 2 off the ground. Aside from a brief detour into TV land when a Zombieland series pilot was made for Amazon (and the series didn't get past the pilot), ZOMBIELAND 2 has seemingly been in constant development ever since 2009, with multiple writers – including THE EXPENDABLES and GODZILLA 2014 co-writer David Callaham – having taken a pass at the script. Every time it starts to feel like we can officially declare the project dead, some kind of news or quote comes along to assure us that the powers that be still want to get a sequel made.
The latest tease that there might someday be a ZOMBIELAND 2 comes from the first film's writers Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick, who have remained attached to the sequel as executive producers while working on other things, like DEADPOOL.
Appearing on AMC's Kevin Smith / Greg Grunberg-hosted show Geeking Out, the writers revealed:
That is breaking news that we're on Zombieland 2 right now. We're sitting with Woody [Harrelson] tomorrow and are going to sort of walk him through some of the stuff we want to do. All the cast is pretty excited."
Led by Harrelson, that cast includes some actors who were on the rise at the time of ZOMBIELAND's release and are quite busy and popular to this day – Jesse Eisenberg, Emma Stone, and Abigail Breslin.
ZOMBIELAND director Ruben Fleischer is expected to return to the helm if/when the sequel happens.
I'm not getting my hopes up that ZOMBIELAND 2 will finally head into production any time soon, but I am totally on board for a sequel if they ever do make it. It will be interesting to see a zombie movie sequel that catches up with characters a decade after we were first introduced to them. As far as I know, that has never been done before. Would a full-on zombie apocalypse even last ten years? I wouldn't think there'd be many zombies left at this point.