After Edge of Tomorrow (or Live. Die. Repeat.) became a modest hit and earned a strong audience following, talk of a sequel has been a hot topic… for the past five years. The Groundhog Day-esque sci-fi action thriller, starring Tom Cruise and Emily Blunt as soldiers in a war against alien invaders, has yet to see its Edge of Tomorrow 2 see the light of day.
The long-awaited follow-up to the film has seen a journey flip-flopping from enthusiastic promise to living under the burden of uncertainty, and back again. Like Tom Cruise’s coward-turned-hero Will Cage, the development of Edge of Tomorrow 2 seems to be trapped in a time loop, which director Doug Liman and original Edge of Tomorrow co-scribe Christopher McQuarrie seem currently unable to pull it out of.
As we're left to wonder when and if this film will ever come to fruition, here's everything we know about the plans for the sequel, starting from after the first film hit theaters.
With the filmmakers gushing over the story they have crafted and Tom Cruise and Emily Blunt having expressed interest in returning, what is taking so long with Edge Of Tomorrow 2 (or Live Die Repeat and Repeat, or whatever the hell they are calling it now)? Why don’t we pull a Will Cage and go back from where we started?
Tom Cruise Hatches An Idea For Edge Of Tomorrow 2
At first, it seemed like Edge of Tomorrow, inspired by Hiroshi Sakurazaka’s graphic novel All You Need Is Kill, was destined to be a box office dud, until positive critical reception and word of mouth (despite confusion over the title) turned it into an international hit. Inspired by the strong cult following the film had since earned, Tom Cruise conjured a concept for a sequel in 2015, which his Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation director Christopher McQuarrie frustratingly could not resist. EOT director Doug Liman was on board for Cruise’s idea as well.
The only one who seemed resistant to returning to the world of Edge of Tomorrow was Emily Blunt, expressing to Uproxx that year that she is “terrified of sequels” and would only reprise the role of Rita “Full Metal Bitch” Vrataski if the story was on par with the predecessor. While she certainly has reason to have reservations, especially considering the 2014 film’s happy ending, Doug Liman and Christopher McQuarrie would eventually tease that the follow-up would surpass the original. It would, of course, need a script first.
Screenwriters Are Hired To Pen Edge of Tomorrow 2
In April 2016, almost two years after the release of Edge of Tomorrow, Deadline reported that Joe Schrapnel and Anna Waterhouse were commissioned to write the follow-up. At the time, the screenwriting duo had gained traction for writing the sports biopic Race and being tapped for this project was shaping to be their most challenging yet, especially after what the director would reveal soon long after.
When speaking with Collider in October 2016, Doug Liman teased that Edge of Tomorrow 2 would be a “sequel that’s a prequel.” Despite a lack of clarity as to how that would be achieved the time, what was clear was the director’s unbridled enthusiasm for what he promised to be a story that is “much better than the original film.” But that premature praise was nothing compared to the claims he would make soon.
Edge Of Tomorrow 2 Teased As A Sequel Like No Other
Around the same time as his Collider interview, Doug Liman told IGN that Edge of Tomorrow 2 would “revolutionize how people make sequels,” but was unable to elaborate. Months later, we received some form of elaboration in the announcement of its new official title: Live Die Repeat and Repeat, an on-the-nose piggyback off of the name the original film was often mistaken for, and eventually changed to, thanks to misleading marketing.
Christopher McQuarrie would chime in the following year, promising to make sense of Edge of Tomorrow’s explanation-demanding ending in a tweet, while Doug Liman would return to the conversation soon after promising a much better arc to the heroic evolution of Tom Cruise’s character. He would later elaborate on this detail by also revealing to Yahoo Movies that the “sequel that’s a prequel” will start where the first film left off before going backwards in time, as a further explanation of how Edge of Tomorrow 2 - sorry, "Live Die Repeat and Repeat" - will be so revolutionary. However, it would soon become apparent that the sequel’s timeline was not the only thing going backwards about it.
Edge Of Tomorrow 2 Script Goes Into A Second Draft
In January 2018, Doug Liman promised to Collider that, after resolving scheduling conflicts, the only thing holding Edge of Tomorrow 2 back was Joe Schrapnel and Anna Waterhouse’s script, which was still being written. However, the following May, Emily Blunt revealed to IndieWire that another script was supposedly “in the works,” which Liman later revealed would be written by him and the first film’s co-scribe Jez Butterworth.
While Doug Liman seemed poised that the story of Edge of Tomorrow 2, which he “loves,” was rapidly approaching home run, Christopher McQuarrie was less certain in his comments. In response to a fan’s question over the status of the sequel on Twitter, the filmmaker revealed that, while mentioning that it was being worked on, he had “no idea how or when it will happen.” Eager fans would be able to put their concerns to rest soon enough… but not for long.
Edge Of Tomorrow 2 Goes Into Development… Or Does It?
In March 2019, nearly four years after Tom Cruise’s idea was first put it into motion, Deadline reported that Edge of Tomorrow 2 was officially in development at Warner Bros., under the title Live Die Repeat and Repeat, of course. This announcement came with the additional update that a third script was being written by The Invention of Lying scribe Matthew Robinson after he pitched his own take on the story.
If that did not already sound like reason for concern, it was months later when, for the first time in the sequel’s progression, Doug Liman became the one to express uncertainty over the film’s future, saying he “had no idea” what its chances are and citing scheduling conflicts as the roadblock to Collider. The last thing we heard in Live Die Repeat and Repeat’s development came in January of this year, when Liman posted an Instagram photo of multiple whiteboards covered in blurred out story concepts for sequel. From the looks of it, if this sequel finally makes it to be big screen, we may be in for quite the head-scratcher.
As you can see, despite all the information we've gotten over the last few years, we still do not have a definitive answer to the initial question, with no release date for Live Die Repeat Repeat set at the moment. Still, the recent instagram post does indicate that the project is still alive.
Until we have all the answers, be sure to check back for updates on the Edge of Tomorrow sequel here on CinemaBlend.
