Demolition Man 2 is in development, Sylvester Stallone says. Set in a future where all violent crime has been eliminated, 1993’s original Marco Brambilla sci-fi film proved to be a perfect vehicle for Stallone, who at the time had seen his star wane after a series of disastrous movies.
Pairing Stallone with rising action star Wesley Snipes and relative unknown Sandra Bullock in the satiric Demolition Man indeed proved a winning formula, as the film grossed $159 million at the box office on a reported budget of $57 million. Now, nearly 30 years after its release, the film is widely regarded as a classic of action-comedy with its outrageous premise featuring Stallone and Snipes as cryogenically frozen artifacts of a more violent age who are reawakened into a world where violence is almost unknown (and even swearing is a fineable offense). Indeed, the film works almost as well as a commentary on ‘80s/’90s action tropes as it does as a straight-forward sci-fi action vehicle.
With the original film maintaining a special place in the hearts of ‘90s action fans, not to mention Stallone boosters, the actor says there has been talk of a follow-up. Speaking to fans in an Instagram Live session, Stallone answered a question about whether there’s a chance of a Demolition Man sequel happening and he replied (via ComicBook.com) "I think there is. We're working on it right now with Warner Bros. and it's looking fantastic. So that should come out, that's going to happen."
Stallone, of course, didn’t give any details about how far into development Demolition Man 2 maybe, so he maybe being a bit overly optimistic about its prospects for coming to fruition. However, if ever there was a time for a sequel to a well-remembered action film of Demolition Man’s period, now would be it. Hollywood indeed has recently been churning out such nostalgia-heavy delayed sequels, with follow-ups to Top Gun, Space Jam, Ghostbusters, Bill and Ted, Avatar, Indiana Jones, and Jackass all headed for screens.
What an actual Demolition Man sequel would look like is anyone’s guess, but there’s definitely a rich vein of material there to be mined, given the world-building that was already done in the first movie. Of course, any sequel would have to address the biggest question from the first movie: how exactly do the three seashells work? Taco Bell certainly would also have to be on-board for heavy product placement (assuming the new movie’s deeper dive into the future still had room for cheap Mexican food). There’s no question that an on-screen reunion for the team of Stallone, Snipes, and Bullock would be well-appreciated, though of course, the death of Snipes’ character in the original movie would have to be addressed (cloning would be an obvious way out of that particular hole).
With any luck, Stallone isn’t simply engaging in wishful thinking when he talks of Demolition Man 2 being something that is “going to happen." It, of course, is very hard to know what announced or rumored projects have a realistic shot at coming to fruition given all the uncertainty gripping the entertainment industry as the coronavirus pandemic continues to unfold.
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