Clint Eastwood in talks for Expendables 3
Exclusive: And producer Avi Lerner reveals who else he wants for the sequel...
[brightcove]1627314831001[/brightcove]
T he Expendables 2 is out this week, and to celebrate, we sat down with producer Avi Lerner to discuss the movie.
And, during our chat, Lerner revealed that he’s in talks with some of the biggest names in cinema for Expendables 3 .
“We’ve approached Clint Eastwood to be one of the guys, we’ve got a character in mind for him. We’re talking to Harrison Ford. [And we want] Wesley Snipes when he comes back from prison. I’ll give you one more name, we’ve got Nicolas Cage to play [one of the characters].”
“And we’re going to bring Mickey Rourke back, if he won’t be too crazy. I like Mickey. And of course, all the existing stars [will return]”
Which is obviously fairly incredible.
If Lerner manages to get all of the above, along with all the returning stars from Expendables 1 and 2 , all we need to know is whether it would be possible for us to buy our tickets now. We'll take 10, just in case we lose the other nine.
Subscribe for a weekly digest of the movie and TV news that matters, direct to your inbox. From first-look trailers, interviews, reviews and explainers, we’ve got you covered.
Before we get to a fairly spoilery section of the interview, we’d just like to apologise for not catching the name of Nicolas Cage’s Expendables 3 character. It’s mainly because we got so excited we dropped our Dictaphone.
We’ve listened to the recording several times now, and we’re pretty sure Lerner says that Cage will be playing someone called Hunter Grimlenson. Or it could be Hunter Gatherer. Or something that has nothing to do with Hunters. You heard it here first!
Anyway, we’re about to get to something very spoilery now, so if you haven’t seen the film yet, we advise heading straight to the comments section.
Seriously, it’ll spoil your fun to read on, so stop now if you haven’t seen the film.
SPOILERS
During our chat with Lerner, Jean-Claude Van Damme wandered over to say hello. He seemed in exceptionally good spirits, and just before he left, he said:
“Thank you for everything Avi, and thank you for Expendables 3 !”
“We can bring in your twin brother!” Lerner replied with a chuckle.
Now, as anyone who’s seen Expendables 2 will attest, that’s pretty much the only way that Van Damme could return.
Though there’s a very real chance Lerner was joking, we would love to see Jean-Claude play his own evil twin in Expendables 3 . Especially as it would be a lovely call-back to his Double Impact days.
END SPOILERS
The Expendables 2 is out on Thursday 16 August. Get yourself to a cinema to see it.
Sam Ashurst is a London-based film maker, journalist, and podcast host. He's the director of Frankenstein's Creature, A Little More Flesh + A Little More Flesh 2, and co-hosts the Arrow Podcast. His words have appeared on HuffPost, MSN, The Independent, Yahoo, Cosmopolitan, and many more, as well as of course for us here at GamesRadar+.
