Complete with Taika Waititi gif, Reynolds posted to his Twitter on Saturday “Aaaannnnd after 3 years messaging as an original IP movie, Disney confirmed today they officially want a sequel. Woo hoo!! #irony.” Though nothing has been revealed via official channels it is telling that both 20th Century Studios retweeted the post and director Shawn Levy responded to the tweet with “Yuuuuuuuup.” Interestingly, Levy and Reynolds have already wrapped their second collaboration together, the time-travel action-comedy “The Adam Project.”
As IndieWire’s Tom Brueggermann mentioned in his weekly look at the box office, “Free Guy” was in a highly unique situation. “Free Guy’ is a delayed holdover from Disney’s Fox acquisition. It’s also the first Disney live-action release in three years that’s not a sequel or tied to a franchise; it’s not even a horror film or an action movie. That makes its theatrical performance even more important: Beyond the revenue, it could have a long-term impact on the kinds of films studios make,” he said. Related How Iger May Do What Chapek Wouldn’t: Spin Off ESPN Sam Worthington Lost Out on ‘Green Lantern’ Role After Questioning Logic of Film: ‘It Didn’t Make Much Sense’ Related The Best Film Sound of 2022 Oscars 2023: Best Documentary Feature Predictions
— Ryan Reynolds (@VancityReynolds) August 14, 2021 Levy has been open about the challenges getting the movie made, and his fears that the lampooning of corporations wouldn’t be well-received by Disney. In a recent interview Levy said, “Disney allowed us to open our very first trailer for ‘Free Guy’ with a joke about ‘the studio that brought you ‘Lion King,’ ‘Beauty and the Beast,’ ‘Cinderella,’ comes…wait for it…a new movie!’” Levy said. “At the time, that was a pretty audacious joke. We realized that Disney was willing to be in on the joke in order to avoid being the butt of the joke. That’s a general rule of comedy. You either make fun of the shit that people make fun of you for or you will be pay for it.” In his review of “Free Guy,” IndieWire’s David Ehrlich said, “‘Free Guy’ is nothing if not a movie that wins you over in spite of your better judgment and best defenses, but its “be the change you wish to see in the world” energy feels like a micro-transactional smokescreen for a corporate monoculture that only values creativity so far as it can be used to fool us into paying for things we already own.” “Free Guy” is in theaters now Sign Up: Stay on top of the latest breaking film and TV news! Sign up for our Email Newsletters here.
