In 1993, Jurassic Park hit theaters to teach us all the consequences of playing God. Through six sequels, that lesson continued to be hammered home with dinosaurs of varying cuteness, and blockbuster thrills, but humanity still hasn’t learned. With the 2026 movie schedule starting to come into focus, perhaps next year will be when we decide to stop tampering with scientific breakthroughs; especially when one of our teachers this time is Liam “The Naked Gun” Neeson.
Welcome to the world of Cold Storage, a 2019 novel from David Koepp, the notable screenwriter from the Jurassic Park universe. Adapting his own novel for the screen, Koepp’s tale of a contagion that could end the world sounds a lot like Michael Crichton’s The Andromeda Strain. However, as you’ll see in the trailer provided below, this new tale puts more of a Slither style spin on things:
Will our Taken hero calming and/or threatening someone over the phone ever stop being amusing? The not-so-serious tone of Cold Storage certainly helps intrigue me into investing in this picture, as it allows Liam Neeson to be very non-chalant about his heroism. It’s not quite the flat-out goofiness I praised in my Naked Gun review, but that’s not a knock.
Rather, it’s a way to set expectations for this upcoming horror/comedy ride, which is so adjacent to Neeson’s action hero era that it feels like a knowing parody in its own right. "But, Mike," you're probably asking your screen, "what about Liam Neeson's supposed action movie retirement? Also, I was promised zombies! Where are the zombies?"
Well, I suppose we can get to the subject of how Stranger Things' Joe Keery and Broadchurch alum Georgina Campbell have to contend with that nightmarish contagion, especially when it seems to do everything from decay its victims to making them outright explode. Those of you squeamish around gore (no matter how green it may be) may want to skip over the next image:
Yeah, that’s what we’re dealing with here, folks: a good old fashioned desert outbreak of a lab-created nightmare, with a handful of people standing between us and extinction. If that’s not a Michael Crichton-coded adventure, then my name is Liam Neeson. Except it isn’t… and I totally know what I’m talking about here.
2026 already looked like a fantastic year for upcoming book to movie adaptations, and that’s just me echoing the enthusiasm surrounding Project Hail Mary’s recent trailer alone. If David Koepp has engineered a dark comedy that takes Crichton bioethics and splices them with a James Gunn-style sensibility, with Mr. Neeson playing a deadpan supporting character, then sign me up.
Unfortunately, Cold Storage doesn’t have a release date just yet, so we’ll have to sit tight for more information. However, with the trailer being released this early, that could be a sign that the studio is bullish on what it's got in the can. So try to contain your excitement by seeing something already on the 2025 movie calendar; like, say, The Naked Gun, which is currently in theaters.
You must confirm your public display name before commenting
Please logout and then login again, you will then be prompted to enter your display name.