Fifth Element Star Teases Leeloo Returning in Animated Spinoff (And It Sounds Awesome)

Actress Milla Jovovich said that she might reprise her role as Leeloo in an animated spinoff of The Fifth Element. She spoke to ComicBook in support of In the Lost Lands, which hits theaters on March 7th in the U.S. Along the way, she mentioned working with filmmaker Luc Besson again, hinting that he may already be planning “some sort of spinoff of a bunch of his characters.” This is the first we’ve heard of such a project, but it’s definitely enough to get fans excited. Jovovich sounds eager to return to one of the first roles that made her a household name.

“I think Luc is making some sort of spinoff of a bunch of his biggest characters, and Leeloo might be one of them,” Jovovich revealed. “An animated, cartoon version. I think back in those days, people weren’t thinking about sequels, it was just about making the best movie you could possibly make. For me, Leeloo was one of the most important characters of my young life at that point. It’s what really introduced me to what being a real actor was about.”

The Fifth Element was released in 1997, and was a huge success for Besson and Jovovich, along with more established stars including Bruce Willis, Gary Oldman, Ian Holm, and Chris Tucker. It’s a sci-fi story about incorporating aspects of the comic books and novels Besson was inspired by growing up. Jovovich played Leeloo, a woman cloned from the remains of an extraterrestrial.

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There’s no telling whether this Fifth Element spinoff will happen, but in the meantime Jovovich is focused on In the Lost Lands. The movie’s official synopsis reads, “Directed by Paul W.S. Anderson and based on George R.R. Martin’s short story, a queen sends the powerful and feared sorceress Gray Alys (Milla Jovovich) to the ghostly wilderness of the Lost Lands in search of a magical power, where the sorceress and her guide, the drifter Boyce (Dave Bautista), must outwit and outfight man and demon.”

Martin is best known for his fantasy series A Song of Ice and Fire, which inspired HBO’s Game of Thrones. Before that, most of his stories were written in a sci-fi setting called “The Thousand Worlds,” but “In the Lost Lands” is one of the few stand-alone stories he wrote. Martin actually made a self-effacing blog post about this when the film adaptation was announced, revealing that he had intended to write a series of stories about Gray Alys to build up to a longer series.

For those interested, “In the Lost Lands” is included in Martin’s book Dreamsongs, which is available in print, digital, and audiobook formats. The film adaptation hits theaters on March 7th in the U.S. The Fifth Element is currently streaming on Peacock.