Back in May this year, you may remember we reported that one of the worst sci-fi films ever created had been granted a sequel. What a sad day that was. No matter how much the news that Beyond Skyline was set to poison cinemas crushed our hearts, we held onto a brief glimmer of hope. For what? Well, hope that it manages to either a) get shelved or B) somehow become totally unlike its predecessor. Now, it looks like the latter has occurred, as Latino Review has it on good authority that The Purge: Anarchy‘s Frank Grillo is considering the lead role.
According to LR’s sources, this second instalment will be “some sort of reboot… supposedly the sequel’s storyline takes place at the same time the first one did.” Sounds to us like a parallel-sequel a la Paranormal Activity 2. But potential direction aside, why would such a critically loathed film even get a sequel? We suspect it’s all about the money, folks. The original 2010 movie was made for $10 million and brought in $78.6 million. That’s a big enough profit margin to get the green light for another outing. While I’m not jumping for joy, if Frank Grillo is going to clamber aboard then there’s reason to be moderately excited about it.
For those of you who were fortunate enough to have said “Hell no, I’d rather have my crotch set on fire” than see the original, here’s a brief rundown. A load of aliens begin tterrorizingLA, causing people to exit their homes and get zapped into a variety of hovering spacecraft. The ‘story’ unfolds through a group of folks who live in an apartment block.
To be honest, all I remember from the movie is loads of talking, people looking out of the window through vertical blinds (which manage to shield humans from the aliens’ sophisticated technology), a quick dash outside before an inevitable attack, then back inside for more looking through the blinds and dull chatter.
Where this parallel-sequel-reboot will go is of little interest to me purely because the first was so awful. But if Grillo’s on board for Beyond Skyline, then all hope is not yet lost.