While it would be very foolish to write any project off as unnecessary before we know anything about it, never mind getting the opportunity to actually clap our eyes on it firsthand, there’s an underlying feeling that a sequel to Gladiator doesn’t really need to exist.
Ridley Scott’s swords-and-sandals epic was a monster hit, box office juggernaut and cultural phenomenon when it first hit theaters over 20 years ago, earning $460 million before going on to win five Academy Awards including Best Picture and Best Actor.
A second chapter has been floated at various points in the decades since, most famously the insane time traveling pitch put forth by Nick Cave, but Scott recently confirmed that he’s planning to shoot Gladiator 2 once he wraps up on Napoleon biopic Kitbag with Joaquin Phoenix in the lead role.
Not only that, but he admitted during an interview with the Zoe Ball Breakfast Show that he’d be an idiot not to step behind the camera himself.
“How could I not do that? It would be critically stupid of me not to do that, wouldn’t it?”
Realistically, cameras could be rolling on the Gladiator sequel by 2023, with Scott’s work ethic restored to its former glories. The filmmaker didn’t see a feature released for four years, but The Last Duel and House of Gucci arrive within six weeks of each other, and he’s already got another two lined up.