1995’s Jumanji is one of the late Robin Williams’ most beloved films, so it was a tall ask to reboot the franchise. Against all the odds, though, 2017’s Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle totally succeeded, with this weekend seeing the release of a third film in the series, The Next Level. We’ve yet to see how it’ll go down, of course, but Sony apparently has enough faith in it to already start work on a fourth movie.
That’s right, according to our sources – the same ones who said Ace Ventura 3 is in development, which has since been corroborated, and that a new Scream movie is happening, which has now been confirmed – the studio is planning on making Jumanji 4, with a plot already mapped out for it. As with The Next Level, director Jake Kasdan and stars Dwayne Johnson, Karen Gillan, Jack Black, Kevin Hart and Nick Jonas are all expected to return and this time around, the twist will be that instead of the real-world characters being sucked into the game, the video game characters and the animal inhabitants of the mystical jungle will be thrown into the real world.
Fans familiar with the original will no doubt pick up on the fact that this storyline recycles the central plot of the 1995 film. Assuming this would round out the renewed trilogy of movies though, borrowing the set-up of the first one would be a neat way of bringing the whole thing full circle. Kasdan’s efforts have always paid homage to the Williams flick, too, with a nod to his character Alan Parrish in Welcome and Bebe Neuwirth expected to reprise her role as Nora Shepherd in Next Level.
This would also switch things up for the leads once again and allow them to play slightly different versions of their characters. If the video game is coming into the real world, they’ll presumably be portraying the game’s characters and not the kids stuck inside the avatars. They’d also likely get to interact with the younger protagonists, Spencer (Alex Wolff), Martha (Morgan Turner), Fridge (Ser’Darius Blain) and Bethany (Madison Iseman).
Assuming The Next Level is another smash, the release schedule set out by the last two films suggests Jumanji 4 could be with us by December 2021. Though given the stars’ busy schedules, a bit of a delay is certainly feasible. In any case, we’ll be sure to let you know as soon as we learn more.
