Zombieland Will Do a Sequel Every Ten Years If Emma Stone Gets Her Way

After nearly a decade away, the Zombieland franchise is coming back for more this fall in Zombieland: Double Tap. While waiting ten years to release a sequel might seem a little unconventional, it sounds like those tied to the franchise wouldn’t mind keeping up that pattern. In a recent interview with Entertainment Weekly, director Ruben Fleischer was asked about a potential third film and revealed that star Emma Stone has a unique suggestion for potential sequels.

“We have to see how this one’s received and if that’s something audiences would want,” Fleischer revealed. “But I think we all had so much fun making this one, we’d be really lucky to get to return to Zombieland. Although, I will say, Emma said, she thought it would be fun if we did one of these every 10 years. Knowing that Woody [Harrelson is] just the healthiest guy there is, he’s going to outlive all of us, and so we can just keep doing them every 10 years, ’til the end of time.”

Fleischer also provided a bit of insight into why there was such a gap of time between the films, and what eventually brought them back for a sequel.

“The easy answer is, I think we all wanted to stretch our legs a little bit and try different things,” Fleischer explained. “I think we were all excited to do other stuff. But, the other thing is, we just couldn’t figure out the right story to tell. It took a minute to get a story that we all felt was worthy, to come back to Zombieland for. We all have so much love for the original. So, we held ourselves to a really high standard as far as making sure that, if we were going to make a sequel, that it be at least as good, if not better, than the original. And that ultimately all comes down to the script. So, we were all demanding and discerning to make sure the story was one that was worth getting the gang back together. Sometimes it does take time to get that right.”

Zombieland: Double Tap will see the return of Columbus (Jesse Eisenberg), Tallahassee (Harrelson), Wichita (Stone), and Little Rock (Abigail Breslin), who have formed a sort of found family in the decade after the events of the first film. The film will feature a slew of new cast members, including Zoey Deutch, Avan Jogia, Rosario Dawson, Thomas Middleditch, Luke Wilson, and Dan Aykroyd.

“Well the reason we’re all doing it again is ’cause we all love the world of the movie so much,” director Ruben Fleischer shared with ComicBook.com earlier this year. “I think it was a real touchstone for all, for me certainly ’cause it was my first movie, but I think for Emma and Jesse it was a really just significant movie in their evolution. And Woody paid me a huge compliment. I was on the phone with him the other day and he said he’s probably made over a hundred movies but the most fond memory he has is making Zombieland.”

“I think we all have this honest nostalgia for the experience of making it and with that being said none of them would agree to do the movie until the script was good enough,” Fleischer continued. “And we’ve been working on it for four years and have made sure that if we’re gonna do it again it’s at least as good if not better than the original and finally I think we have a script that we all feel really confident in go making and yeah, ’cause it’s such a precious thing none of us want to tarnish its place, we only wanna build upon it.”

Would you want to see the Zombieland franchise put out a sequel every decade? Share your thoughts with us in the comments below!

Zombieland: Double Tap is expected to debut on October 18th.