Tropic Thunder is one of the best Hollywood comedies in recent memory. From its opening moments, it delivers laugh after laugh to keep audiences wildly entertained. There’s a lot to enjoy in the film, but arguably its most memorable aspect is Tom Cruise’s performance as foul-mouthed studio executive Les Grossman. Thanks to his intense tirades and over-the-top demeanor, Les quickly became a fan-favorite character, so it didn’t come as any surprise when word broke that a Les Grossman spinoff was in development. However, Tropic Thunder is nearly 20 years old, and such a project has yet to come to fruition. But Tropic Thunder co-writer and star Justin Theroux has an update.
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In an interview with ComicBook to promote the release of Fallout Season 2 (streaming on Prime on December 17th), Theroux addressed the status of the Les Grossman spinoff. “This has been something that has been kicked around in theory and in reality and there’s been a couple of attempts at points of entry,” he said. “But, I think we all look forward to hopefully making that happen. That would be great, and I have some ideas for it, and some of those ideas have been expressed, but I can’t really give you any other update that there’s nothing currently. There’s no start date or anything.”
Now Is the Perfect Time for a Les Grossman Spinoff
It’s disappointing that there still isn’t a start date, but at the same time, Theroux’s update is encouraging. It sounds like the project remains in active development, and there’s still hope it will eventually get off the ground. After all this time, someone involved could have pulled the plug and killed the project, feeling it’s now too late. It’s great to hear this is still something Theroux wants to do, and while a two-decade gape between installments isn’t necessarily ideal, now could be just the right time for the Les Grossman spinoff to happen.
Tropic Thunder is a sharp piece of satire that lampoons the entire film industry, poking fun at everything from never-ending action franchises to method actors who go to extreme lengths to win awards. And while many of these elements still remain in today’s Hollywood, a lot has changed (to put things in perspective, Tropic Thunder released in the same summer as Iron Man). With the rise of streaming services, shared universes, mergers between studios, and more, there’s plenty of fresh material for the Tropic Thunder team to explore now, using the character of Les Grossman to explore how crazy things have gotten.
Comedy sequels and spinoffs are notoriously tricky to pull off, and while the track record for legacy comedy sequels is mixed at best, this could be an instance where extra time away benefits a franchise. If the Les Grossman spinoff came out shortly after Tropic Thunder, it would run the risk of being more of the same. But now, in 2020s Hollywood, there are new angles to tackle and different things to say. Undoubtedly, the spinoff would retain much of Tropic Thunder‘s core DNA, but it would have a new perspective, offering its critiques on the current state of the film industry. With the always-game Cruise on board, Les could be put in highly comedic situations where he has to deal with headache after headache.
There is an argument to be made that Tropic Thunder (particularly Les Grossman) would be better off as a one-off. Cruise’s performance was so unexpected that it would be difficult to capture that lightning in a bottle again. But as long as Theroux has good ideas, it’s a concept worth developing. The spoof movie has been making a comeback thanks to titles like The Naked Gun and the upcoming Spaceballs II, so there’s room in the Hollywood landscape for a searing parody of the business at large. Hopefully the next time Theroux comments on the spinoff, there’s a start date in place.
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Image courtesy of Netflix -
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