On Friday the 13th in 2017, we may not have gotten a new Jason Voorhees film, but many moviegoers were pleased with another new horror film released that October: Happy Death Day. The overall positive reception for the Groundhog Day-esque slasher may have some horror fans wondering if a sequel could be in the works, and while no follow-up film has officially been announced, in a recent interview lead actress Jessica Rothe shared some intriguing details and hopes for a potential sequel.
In an interview with Collider, Rothe, who in Happy Death Day plays college student Tree Gelbman, a character who relives her death on her birthday over and over again, spoke enthusiastically about director Christopher Landon's idea for a sequel to the horror comedy, saying that this time around, the story would have a Back to the Future vibe that would take place immediately after the first film:
"Chris has done this incredible thing where the sequel, the way he described it to me, elevates the movie from being a horror movie – and I wouldn’t even say it’s just a horror movie because it’s a horror, comedy, rom-com drama – into a Back to the Future type of genre film where the sequel joins us right from where we left off, it explains a lot of things in the first one that didn’t get explained, and it elevates everything. I was really pleased to know that we weren’t just gonna be pushing all the buttons that people loved the first time, over and over again, ’cause I think that gets old. I’m really excited to see if it comes to fruition and, if it does, what the final product looks like. I hope we get to do it! I had a ball!"
Again, there's no word yet on if a Happy Death Day sequel will happen, but Rothe seems to be game for it, and the box office success of the heartfelt horror comedy (it brought in over $55 million in the US and over $100 million worldwide) has to at least pique the interest of Blumhouse and Universal.
With Paranormal Activity: The Marked Ones, Scouts Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse, and now Happy Death Day, director Christopher Landon has proven that he can compellingly tell a wide variety of horror stories on the big screen. While it remains to be seen if he'll return to the world of Happy Death Day, he did express interest in doing a sequel in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter last October:
"I will say that if we are lucky, and people like the movie and we get to do another one, I do have a sequel ready in my head, and it's definitely not what anyone is expecting, but it will make a lot of sense. And it will answer a lot of questions that may pop up in the first movie for people. But that's only if I get to do it. If I don't, I'm probably just taking it to my grave."
We'll be sure to keep you updated on any official news regarding another Happy Death Day film. In the meantime, do you want to see a Happy Death Day sequel, or would you prefer that Tree's time loop adventure stay confined to one film? Let us know in the comments below, and head over to Collider for the full interview with Rothe.
Raised on a steady diet of R.L. Stine’s Goosebumps books and Are You Afraid of the Dark?, Derek has been fascinated with fear since he first saw ForeverWare being used on an episode of Eerie, Indiana.
When he’s not writing about horror as the Senior News Reporter for Daily Dead, Derek can be found daydreaming about the Santa Carla Boardwalk from The Lost Boys or reading Stephen King and Brian Keene novels.
Daily Dead's Official Podcast! Daily Dead's Official Podcast!
