Matt Damon and Ben Affleck exploded into Hollywood with Good Will Hunting. The 1997 drama sees Damon playing an unlikely mathematical genius, encouraged by Robin Williams’ kindly Professor. The movie was a colossal hit, grossing $225 million on a $10 million budget and scoring nine Academy Award nominations (with a notable win for Best Original Screenplay for Damon and Affleck).
It ends on a hopeful note, but could the door still be open for a long-delayed sequel? Damon hinted that a script had been pitched in an interview with Variety, but Affleck quickly scotched the rumor by saying “it’s not a sequel we’re going to pursue.”
Damon and Affleck have previously parodied the idea of a cash-in sequel in Kevin Smith’s 2001 movie Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back. There, we see the pair shooting Good Will Hunting 2: Hunting Season, which sees a miserable Affleck keeping the paycheck in mind with director Gus van Sant counting bills in the background, and ends with Damon whipping out a shotgun, blasting a guy across the room and declaring “it’s hunting season!”
After they went so far in mocking the idea that Good Will Hunting should have a sequel, it’s probably unlikely that they’d ever return to the film that established them as a force to be reckoned with. But, hey, stranger things have happened in Hollywood so who knows?
Either way, Damon and Affleck are reuniting once again in Air, about the origins of the Air Jordan shoe line. Air lands in theaters on April 5, and is the first movie by Amazon Studios to get an exclusive theatrical release since 2019’s Late Night.