Creepshow’s Greg Nicotero Wants to Reboot Creature From the Black Lagoon With Robert Rodriguez

Thanks to the success of Leigh Whannell’s The Invisible Man last year, a number of Universal Monster movie reboots have been announced, with makeup effects icon and Creepshow showrunner Greg Nicotero recently detailing that he’s often spoken with The Mandalorian director Robert Rodriguez about developing a reboot of Creature from the Black Lagoon together. With the filmmaker noting that he’s had a number of discussions about such a project with Rodriguez, it’s unknown when, or if, such a revival could actually happen, with Nicotero noting that Universal Monsters don’t get much better than the famed Creature. Creepshow Season 2 premieres on Shudder on April 1st.

“I think for any creature, monster kid, Creature from the Black Lagoon is the quintessential monster movie,” Nicotero shared with ComicBook.com. “I think Robert Rodriguez and I always talk about like, ‘Hey, man. Maybe we should co-direct a Creature from the Black Lagoon movie,’ because he and I have identical tastes. We love Jaws. We love The Thing. We love Escape from New York and Blade Runner. We toy with the idea of like, ‘Wouldn’t it be cool if we remade Creature from the Black Lagoon?’ And I know they’ve been trying to do it forever, but, for me, that’s the quintessential Universal Monster movie.”

He added, “I’m always curious because I feel like one of the reasons why Walking Dead became the show that it became was because Frank Darabont entered that universe with respect. He loved Night of the Living Dead and he wanted to pay tribute to the [George A.] Romero universe. I remember talking to Frank years before Walking Dead ever even happened and saying, ‘Man, I would just love to visit that universe because I love the idea of there being a survival story set in that world.’”

As opposed to other Universal Monsters like Dracula or The Mummy, the titular Creature hasn’t been reimagined as often as its peers. However, Nicotero noted that a key component of a potential reboot would be that it has to embody the spirit of the debut 1954 film instead of attempting to reimagine a new take on the concept.

“All of these remakes and retellings and stuff, the one thing that they need to have is they need to have respect and passion for the genre,” Nicotero expressed. “It’s not just taking a title and putting your own spin on it because anybody can put whatever spin they want on it because everyone’s going to have a different approach, but you have to have respect for the original material, I feel like that, for me, is one of the things that really drives me, because I have respect for the storytelling that was done on the original Creepshow and everything that George did, everything that [Stephen King] has done. So, to have the ability to approach a project like that with respect, I just feel is the key ingredient in the success of rebooting anything.”

Stay tuned for details on a possible reboot of Creature from the Black Lagoon. Check out the Season 2 premiere of Creepshow on Shudder on April 1st.

Would you like to see the filmmakers work on this reboot? Let us know in the comments below or contact Patrick Cavanaugh directly on Twitter to talk all things Star Wars and horror!