Michael B. Jordan may "be up for" doing a prequel to new genre-bending vampire horror Sinners, but writer-director Ryan Coogler reckons it's good to leave movies with a little mystery.
In the star-studded film, which also features the likes of Wunmi Mosaku, Jack O'Connell, Delroy Lindo, and Hailee Steinfeld, Jordan's characters, twin brothers Smoke and Stack, return to their Mississippi hometown to set up a juke joint. Several references are made to the siblings' pasts, from their relationship with their abusive father and their time serving in World War I to the years they've recently spent working for a mobster in Chicago.
While there may not be scope for a straight sequel (this is a horror movie after all), might Jordan be keen to explore the Moore boys' adventures with Al Capone in a follow-up?
"I mean, you know, I'm always… I'd be up for it," the Creed star tells GamesRadar+ when we ask, before gesturing to Coogler. "Not saying he wouldn't, but he calls the shots!"
"I call the shots? Zinzi?!" Coogler laughs, trying to catch the attention of his wife and Sinners producer. "What we doing?!" a grinning Jordan chimes in.
"I mean, no, for me, my favorite movies are ones where it feels like a world was happening before and a world is gonna happen after," the Black Panther director adds. "So that's the best compliment somebody can say."
"Yeah, that you care about the characters, and that you wanna see what happened to 'em? What happened before?" says Jordan.
Due to Sinners covering a lot of ground – jilted exes, prohibition, what it's like to be a Black American living in the Jim Crow South, hoodoo, and more – a character we don't get to learn too much about at all is Jack O'Connell's fanged foe Remmick. Behind the scenes, though, the British actor worked with Coogler to figure out who his banjo-playing bloodsucker was before he started terrorizing Smoke, Stack, and their pals.
Not that he'll divulge that information, mind you. "One of the things I love about Ryan is you can ask him any question relevant to the story or the character, and if he doesn't have the answer straight away, he will make sure he's got one by the end of the day, even if you've had to answer it together," he says.
"He's so inquisitive and so he interrogates every detail with you. I mean, Remmick has, like 600-700 years worth of heritage, just by nature of being a vampire. As long as he follows a certain set of rules, he just lives forever. So there was all that. How you pack that into, you know, two hours worth of cinema or a performance is unknown to me, which is why it was great to have someone like Coogler, who's there with you all the time, just as curious as you are."
Sinners releases in UK and US cinemas on April 18. For more, check out our guide to the most exciting upcoming horror movies heading our way.
