Like a lot of long awaited sequels that cross the decades, Labyrinth 2 has had its ups and downs on the road to production. Today is, unfortunately, one of the latter occasions, as the film has lost its director, The Girl in the Spider’s Web’s Fede Alvarez. The decision was his own, and it was a big step backward for some very important reasons.
As a guest of The Boo Crew podcast, Alvarez went into this rather detailed story as to why he gave up the storied gig he’d scored a couple years back:
It’s so hard to decide what’s worth your time. And what’s worth the attention of the audience. Labyrinth was something I was going to do at some point, but then I stepped down. I just felt…when people have a preconceived notion of what something should be, it’s very hard to succeed – to surprise them. They’re just expecting the same thing again. So I just decided I didn’t want to do things as a director that people knew already what it was. Or have a preconceived notion of how it should look on the screen. So Labyrinth would be something that people would judge that way, so I decided not to do it. My last movie (The Girl in the Spider’s Web) was me going to make a movie for the studio for the first time, like from inside. There were some things that I enjoyed and some things I didn’t about that. I’ve since wanted to just make the movies that really matter to me.
If there’s a reason that Fede Alvarez has turned down the gig, it’s undoubtedly the fact that his time directing The Girl in the Spider’s Web turned him off of undertaking a project that felt more like a studio hire rather than something he truly felt aligned with. Between feelings like those, as well as the disappointing performance of the action-packed adaptation/reboot, Labyrinth 2 seems like it was bound to fall by the wayside for some time.
This isn’t a terrible shocker, as earlier this year Fede Alvarez was announced as hopping aboard Don’t Breathe 2, having already helmed its predecessor. Though that shift saw Alvarez only coming back in a co-writer’s capacity, so there’s still room for the man who also left his stamp on the Evil Dead franchise to pick up another full time gig when he feels up to it.
Of course, the worldwide standstill in film and TV productions has any project that’s hoping to get in front of cameras at a disadvantage right now. But Labyrinth 2 is in a deeper rut of non-movement than most other projects you’ve read about in recent times. Currently, without a director at the helm, it feels like this sequel might find itself sent back to development hell.
We’ll see where things go from this point, as any further Labyrinth 2 updates will be reported as they develop, here at CinemaBlend.
