The only sequel John Carpenter ever directed was Snake Plissken’s second outing in Escape from L.A., which proceeded to bomb at the box office. However, the legendary filmmaker’s back catalogue has proven to be incredibly fertile ground for Hollywood’s perceived lack of imagination, with many of his best pics being either rebooted or remade.
Assault on Precinct 13, The Thing and Halloween have all been redone to disappointing results, while proposed reinventions for Escape from New York and Big Trouble in Little China have languished in development hell for years. Admittedly, David Gordon Green’s sequel/reboot hybrid of Halloween was a massive success from a critical and commercial standpoint, with Carpenter heavily involved behind the scenes on the rejuvenated series, but so far, that’s been the one and only outlier.
The worst remake by far, though, has to be 2005’s The Fog, a painfully dull and almost shockingly inept retread that somehow managed to turn a profit after earning over $46 million at the box office on an $18 million budget despite being universally panned by critics, and it still holds an embarrassing Rotten Tomatoes score of just 4%.
The genre icon has been teasing a return to directing recently, and in a new interview, he revealed that discussions over a direct sequel to his 1980 cult classic version of The Fog have taken place, and he’s very receptive to the idea.
“There’s been talk of a sequel to The Fog. There’s been talk of sequels for a bunch of my movies. They just haven’t happened yet because of various reasons. But yeah, we’ve talked about them and I’m open to them.”
Star Adrienne Barbeau admitted last summer that she’s definitely willing to return for a follow-up, although it remains to be seen if there’s much genuine interest in revisiting The Fog. The original might be a favorite among Carpenter’s fanbase, but we’ve already had one update of the concept that wasn’t exactly well received, which is probably more than enough.
