Cast one eye over the summer blockbuster window and you’ll discover one success story after another, with Furious 7, Jurassic World and Avengers: Age of Ultron all breaking box office records in one way or the other. And though it may not have gone down as a financial success in Warner’s eyes, Mad Max: Fury Road sticks out like a flame-spouting electric guitar against the Australian desert as one of the more memorable releases of 2015, which has naturally ignited talk of a direct sequel.
From Tom Hardy revealing that he’s locked in for at least three more installments as the lone wolf Max Rockatansky to the studio labelling the second installment as Mad Max: The Wasteland, there’s been plenty for fans to dissect since Miller’s blockbuster took the generic parameters of the action genre and blew them to kingdom come back in May of this year.
Now, while speaking in an interview with Deadline, the esteemed filmmaker offered a status update on the all-but-confirmed follow-up, all the while noting that it won’t be titled Mad Max: The Wasteland.
The more I speculate about what’s happening, the more I try to avoid spoilers this far out, and also I find myself talking around in circles. So the best thing I can say is that we’re definitely in discussion about making more of these, but the timing of it, I’m really not sure. Probably won’t be called Wasteland. I can say that. It was just the working title we gave it.
Alas, it’s still early days on the development of George Miller’s Mad Max sequel. If the director sticks to his guns, though, Charlize Theron’s kingdom-shaking Imperator Furiosa won’t be involved in the next film, with the director revealing he intends to save the character for a future installment. And with that, let the speculation begin for Mad Max 5.