Over the weekend, Deadline dropped an interview with Warner Bros. CEOs Mike De Luca and Pam Abdy, in which they confirm a third Beetlejuice movie is in the works, as well as a new Gremlins movie.
When asked if a sequel was underway for Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, De Luca replied: “Imminently. The ink might not be dry on the deals yet, but imminently.”
News of a Beetlejuice Beetlejuice sequel (which will almost certainly be titled Beetlejuice Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, right?) shouldn't come as a huge surprise; the long-awaited sequel to Tim Burton's 1988 horror-comedy classic racked up $451.9 million at the global box office upon release in September 2024.
While nothing is confirmed yet, we can't imagine any other director taking the reigns on Beetlejuice Beetlejuice Beetlejuice aside from Burton, and it's safe to say Michael Keaton will almost certainly return as the titular Ghost with the Most.
The new Gremlins installment, which was first reported in January of this year, would see Chris Columbus, who wrote the original Joe Dante-directed 1984 classic Gremlins, at the helm with a script he's been teasing since 2017:
“I’m really proud of the script […] It is as twisted and dark as anything, so we’ll see. It’s always a budgetary conversation when we’re going to shoot it. I wanted to go back to the really twisted sensibility of the first movie. I found that was a very easy place for me to fall back into and start writing again so hopefully we’ll see that movie soon.”
Abdy doesn't give much away in Deadline's interview, just confirming that: “We’re super excited about Amblin developing with Chris Columbus, new entries in the Gremlins and Goonies franchises.”
Previously said to be involved in this iteration of Gremlins 3 was Carl Ellsworth, who wrote Wes Craven’s airborne thriller Red Eye and co-scripted the Last House on the Leftremake for Craven. In our 2020 interview with Ellsworth, he expands that the potential movie:
“…was thought of as a direct sequel mostly to the first film—not discounting the second one by any stretch, but I saw it as very much a passing-the-baton story, staying in the tone of the original. I think that helped get me the job: I said, ‘Yeah, there’s a lot of humor in the movie, helped by the classic Jerry Goldsmith score that gives us a license to laugh, but it’s first and foremost a horror movie.’
Whether or not Warner Bros.' new Gremlins movie is the fabled Gremlins 3 detailed above remains to be seen, but rest assured we will bring you any news as it rolls in.
