We are in the middle of an M. night Shyamalan renaissance. His latest, Split, has garnered mostly praise from critics and enjoyed the fourth biggest January opening of all time this past weekend. This, coupled with his modest 2015 hit The Visit, points to a second coming of the once deified new voice in thriller filmmaking – before the wheels fell off.
And now that M. Night Shyamalan has found his groove once again, he thinks it’s the perfect time to make a sequel to one of his very best films, 2000’s Unbreakable.
Shyamalan spoke to Uproxx about Split, as well as his upcoming projects. And he didn’t mince words when he mentioned Unbreakable. “I do intend on making a final Unbreakable movie,” he said, “and I’m intending on doing it next.” It doesn’t get much clearer than this.
Unbreakable was Shyamalan’s sophomore feature, following the explosive success of The Sixth Sense. At the time, it was met with not so much a shrug as a question mark. The superhero origin story was not in the shorthand of cinematic vernacular back in 2000, and people expecting a supernatural thriller may have been a bit disappointed.
But time has only strengthened Unbreakable. Bruce Willis and Samuel L. Jackson are both wonderful in their opposing roles, and the film itself remains one of the best of its kind even though it won’t ever be considered in the same breath as modern superhero films. Which gets me to this sequel, and how it might fare now, in the era of the MCU and DCEU, when bigger and louder is the modus operandi.
Whatever Shyamalan intends to do with it, I have a newfound faith in his abilities to craft a compelling story. We will keep you up to date when more information on the sequel heads our way.
