District 9 Sequel Could Finally Start Filming Soon

Back in 2009, Neill Blomkamp’s District 9 became a breakout hit not only for the director, but also for star Sharlto Copley, with the nature of the sci-fi narrative leaving room for plenty of follow-up stories, as Copley recently confirmed that the long-rumored District 10 could finally start moving forward. Given that District 9, like the best sci-fi stories, found ways to reflect the real-world cultural climate, the actor admitted that Blomkamp wants to ensure that a follow-up film could come with the same effectiveness as the original, so neither is rushing to make the project happen before it’s ready.

“Yeah, man, we’ve been working. I did a draft, I sent it back to him. He’s done a draft. It’s like just tiring to find the right story,” Copley recently explained to BroBible. “There were some things going on socio-politically that [Blomkamp] felt maybe timing-wise he didn’t want to go immediately. So maybe in like a year, year-and-a-half [we’ll begin filming]. He wants to have something to say.”

Unfortunately, despite the success of District 9, the tentative follow-up is only one of multiple Blomkamp projects that have struggled to come to life.

Back in 2015, the filmmaker began showing off concept art for an Aliens sequel that would have ignored the events of Alien 3 and Alien: Resurrection, bringing back Sigourney Weaver’s Ripley and Michael Biehn’s Hicks. At the same time, franchise creator Ridley Scott was working on the sequel to Prometheus, Alien: Covenant, with that film going on to earn an underwhelming financial reception. Blomkamp would go on to confirm that the project was scrapped, while Scott downplayed the legitimacy of that sequel ever earning substantial development momentum.

In 2018, reports emerged that Blomkamp was attached to a new take on RoboCop, which similarly would have ignored multiple sequels and instead connected to the debut film, with original writer Ed Neumeier attached. In 2019, Blomkamp took to Twitter to confirm that he had parted ways from RoboCop Returns, with reports emerging later that year that filmmaker Abe Forsythe had boarded the project as its director. 

Despite the setbacks of other projects, District 10 being a follow-up to Blomkamp’s own movie might make it a more likely project to come to fruition, even if there’s still a wait ahead of us. Stay tuned for more details on District 10.

Are you hoping the sequel finally happens? Let us know in the comments or contact Patrick Cavanaugh directly on Twitter to talk all things Star Wars and horror!