Christopher McQuarrie Offers More Insight for EDGE OF TOMORROW Sequel
Christopher McQuarrie and Tom Cruise have become quite a force to be reckoned with. They've worked on some great movies together over the years such as Jack Reacher, Edge of Tomorrow, and Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation, which is blowing up at the box office.
McQuarrie worked on the script for Edge of Tomorrow, and it seems like he's on board to work on it again if he gets the chance. Cruise recently revealed that he already pitched an idea for a sequel to McQuarrie, director Doug Liman, and co-star Emily Blunt.
Edge of Tomorrow was a great film, and it really doesn't need a sequel, but of course, if they made one, I'd have to watch it! Uproxx recently conducted a lengthy interview with McQuarrie and when a sequel was brought up, he said,
"It all comes down to Warner Bros. and Doug Liman and Emily Blunt saying yes. The idea is there. At worst, it’s the kernel of an idea – which is, on one hand, great, but on the other hand, I know what a nightmare that is. I know that I’ll be in the void trying to figure that out. And even then when it came out in the press after Tom had mentioned it, right away, there were people on social media saying, 'Don’t do it, it should never have a sequel, etc., etc.' And I’m just laughing because I’m like, 'You guys don’t even know what we are talking about! You have no idea!' Look, that was one of the best creative teams I’ve ever worked with as far as a team of rivals: Emily is one facet of that; Doug Liman is a completely different and opposing force; Tom Cruise is another. And there I am in the middle, just playing to these three really strong, really smart people."
Now, if things do actually come together for the sequel and WB decides it's something they want to pursue, it might be easier to sell to audiences this time around. For some reason, the first movie was such a hard sell. Probably because no one was familiar with it, and the studio wasn't quite sure how to market it. So what would make the sequel an easy sell? McQuarrie explained,
"What I’ve learned, having made Mission, is what I would write into the movie to make that movie an easier sell. Edge of Tomorrow was incredibly difficult to market. From the look of the film… To the title of the film, whatever the title was, whether it was All You Need is Kill or Edge of Tomorrow — and God help us figuring out what the title of the sequel is. The Edge of the Day After Tomorrow? I don’t know. But the humor in the film took a good 35 minutes to really dawn on you – the movie really sneaks up on you and takes this sudden left turn. The movie didn’t have the moments that a trailer needs to tell you, 'This is the experience you’re going to have.' Jack Reacher was a really tough movie to market and we were constantly struggling.
"Further truth: If people are talking about your movie on social media the weekend that it opens and telling each other to see the movie, you’re already fucked. It’s not a driver of getting people to go see a quality movie. You need to be building your social media campaign a year before the movie comes out. The movie that’s doing it really well is Spectre — Spectre is doing a great job of getting you excited about Bond a full year before Bond is out. That’s how you do a long lead, whet their appetite, cover of magazines and social media to make it an event that people want to see. Edge of Tomorrow didn’t have a presence on social media until the weekend it came out, thenpeople go, “Oh my God, it’s really good” … it was too little, too late. Jack Reacher was difficult thing to sell because it’s that $60 million, not a blockbuster — it ain’t Whiplash and it ain’t The Avengers."
He went on to explain the advantages of working with Cruise on these movies.
"I love working with Tom. We’ve really clicked. And I’ve entered into a zone where I’m going from movie to movie – where, for years, I couldn’t get anything – and now just going from movie to movie without any real creative interference. There’s no noise, no bother. That is something that you can never take for granted, and you’d be a fool to walk away from. At the same time, Edge of Tomorrow was so hard and was so draining. When we went out to dinner when we were making Mission and Tom said, 'I have an idea for the sequel to Edge, and I said, 'I don’t want to fucking hear it. I do not want to know!' And he pitched the idea to me and he finished pitching it, I was like, 'Goddammit, why did you do that?'"
Sounds like whatever Cruise came up with for the sequel is an awesome idea! It will be interesting to see if the studio ever ends up moving forward with it. If they do do it, they have to bring back Bill Paxton!