21 Jump Street Team Reveals Why They’re Skipping a Sequel for the New Movie, Will It Confuse Fans?

21 Jump Street was the movie that solidified Phil Lord and Chris Miller as a hit directorial team, after getting their big break with the animated cult-classic, Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs. Not only did the pair dust off the Jump Street TV franchise of the late 1980s/early 1990s, but they also helped usher in a wave of blockbuster comedy movies that became a staple of the early 2010s. 21 Jump Street (2012) made over $200 million at the box office, while its sequel, 22 Jump Street (2014), made over $330 million. The threequel (23 Jump Street) seems like a no-brainer, but it never actually happened.

Now, 24 Jump Street is in the works, but it’s already facing a major marketing hurdle: confusing the heck out of fans who think they already missed out on the third film. So what is the deal with the jump in numbers on 24 Jump Street? We’re finally getting the answer from Lord and Miller themselves.

21 Jump Street Directors Explain 24 Jump Street Title for Threequel

In a new Empire Magazine feature, Lord and Miller are discussing the status of another threequel: the animated film Spider-Man: Beyond the Spider-Verse. However, it was hard not to see the parallels between the challenges of making Beyond the Spider-Verse and the long-delayed making of 24 Jump Street.

The question at hand is: why not just go with the title that everyone expected, 23 Jump Street? According to Lord and Miller, it’s because that film did exist at one point, but is no longer possible now. And they just couldn’t pave over it with a replacement idea.

“We developed a 23 Jump Street, and I think this is just out of respect for that,” Lord said. “We’re calling this 24, out of respect for the dead.”

Understandably, Lord and Miller feel some kind of way about the title. 23 Jump Street got announced in 2014, the same year that the sequel earned even bigger returns at the box office. It seemed like Sony Pictures was motivated, Lord and Miller had an idea, and the train was set to leave the station. It was Channing Tatum who showed doubt, saying things to the press like “There’s always a moment when you’re trying to make a sequel that you think to yourself, no matter how well the first one did, ‘God, the bar is set so high — should we actually go back to do this again?’ Everyone wants you to go back in, but you all look at each other and say, ‘Is this worth it?’”

Things got more complicated when it was revealed that 23 Jump Street was actually going to be MIB23, a crossover between the Jump Street franchise and Men In Black. That concept would’ve been very complicated to meld together, which is likely why it never came to fruition. However, it was still a lot of creative conceptual work being done by Lord, Miller, and the rest of the team involved – enough work that 24 Jump Street feels like it has to be a whole new project.

“There was a script that was made years ago. And the dust has been blown off of it, and it’s being rewritten right now,” Miller added. “Here’s hoping it’s clean and rad and powerful.”

Unfortunately, mainstream moviegoers aren’t always the most savvy; I often tell a story about the old friend who once got mad that a movie called The Dark Knight was copying from Batman lore. So despite the reasonable logic, the confusion over 24 Jump Street‘s name isn’t likely to end.

Rodney Rothman, one of the directors of Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, is both directing and co-writing 24 Jump Street; Jonah Hill and Meghan Malloy are helping with the rewrite. Hill will also be returning to star in the film alongside co-star Channing Tatum, with Ice Cube reprising his role as the unit’s captain.

24 Jump Street is in development.