With ‘Hunger Games: Ballad Of Songbird And Snakes’ Complete, Director Francis Lawrence Says “My Focus Is On ‘Constantine 2′”
In a positive turn of fate for the sequel roughly 18 years in the making, now that his latest film Hunger Games: Ballad of Songbird and Snakes is finally complete and in theaters, director Francis Lawrence says that he’s turning all of his focus towards development on Constantine 2.
Lawrence confirmed his return to work on the long-awaited film while giving a November 21st ‘post-game’ interview regarding the aforementioned Hunger Games prequel to The Hollywood Reporter’s Brian Davids.
Following a lengthy discussion regarding his work in Panem, the director was eventually asked by Davids if the recent Warner Bros. Discovery merger and subsequent DC Studios shake-up had ever, at any time, left him fearful that his plans to revisit Keanu Reeve’s interpretation of the eponymous Hellblazer were once again meant for the grave, to which he affirmed, “No, but we’ve had many obstacles.”
“Me, Keanu [Reeves], [and writer] Akiva [Goldsman] have tried over the years to wrangle some control of the character again, because it had been handed over,” recalled Lawrence. “I think NBC did a TV show, and then J.J. [Abrams] was going to try and do something. And then the regime at DC changed, and they’ve got their plans. But luckily, we managed to wrangle some control and started working on some ideas for Constantine 2, which we’re really excited about.”
“It’s still the very beginning, as the strike put it on hold for a little bit,” he then detailed of the film’s progress. “So we’re probably going to start getting back together after Thanksgiving, and dig back in to try and crack it.”
Unfortunately for fans eager to revisit Lawrence’s interpretation of the chain-smoking mage, outside of its existence and the involvement of its original creative trio, as of writing details regarding Constantine 2 remain extremely scarce.
Providing the first real update on the film’s direction since its 2022 development confirmation just last month to the BroBible’s Post Credit podcast, Lawrence detailed,”Those kinds of dark DC characters, Vertigo characters, have bounced around, and we’ve tried to gain control. We finally have, and Keanu, I, and Akiva Goldsman, who did the movie together originally, are batting around ideas, but we got sort of halted by the strike. However, we are actively coming up with ideas to create a part two, and it will be very rated R.”
Met by the assertion from the outlet that, thanks to the character being one of the few to actually age in the comics, the length of time between both Constantine films would be less jarring to audiences compared to most other super hero properties, the director then revealed that John’s aging would in fact play a role in the sequel’s narrative.
“Without spilling too much,” explained Lawrence, “I would say, yes, my instinct is, as of now, the idea we have is that we would not be pretending that this is, you know, what happens two weeks after the last Constantine, but that this is an older version of John Constantine.”
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