Buzz buzz: Our prayers have been answered, because the only two movies that actually deserve to become franchises are now getting sequels. First there was the announcement last year that Russell Crowe would return to ride his little scooter in a sequel to “The Pope’s Exorcist,” and now, Jason Statham is getting the beehive back together in a sequel to his best action movie in years.
That’s right, “The Beekeeper” will ride again, with Deadline reporting that Statham is returning to star in a sequel to his only 2024 action film, which was a box office and streaming hit. Not only that, but “The Beekeeper 2” will be directed by none other than Indonesian director and guys-beating-the-everloving-gory-s***-out-of-each-other enthusiast Timo Tjahjanto (“The Night Comes for Us,” the upcoming “Nobody 2”).
The original “The Beekeeper” was directed by David Ayer and starred Statham as an ordinary beekeeper who is also a former assassin who worked for a secret organization known as The Beekeepers (there are a lot of bee-related puns in the movie, folks). When the beekeeper’s landlady becomes the victim of a phishing scam, he takes matters into his own hands and shoots and kills his way through a criminal enterprise that goes all the way to the top — it gets more ridiculous than you can possibly imagine.
According to Deadline, Kurt Wimmer (“Equilibrium,” “Law Abiding Citizen”), who wrote the original movie, is coming back to write the screenplay for the sequel, and the studio is looking to also bring back Ayer as a producer for the follow-up.
The beehive never dies
“The Beekeeper” is in some ways Jason Statham doing his version of John Wick, but that is just scratching the surface of the ludicrous fun his movie has to offer. It starts and ends with the bee puns, because this movie sure loves them, and loves to poke fun at the title of the movie in every way possible — like Jason Statham’s Adam Clay throwing a pot of honey at a bad guy with a machine gun, then lighting the honey (and the bad guy) on fire because — as one character explains — honey is “flammable as f***.” (Granted, /Film was immediately on the task and proved that honey was not actually flammable, but that’s the magic of movies for you.)
The addition of Timo Tjahjanto is what really makes this news intriguing. The Indonesian director is one of the best action directors working today, capable of delivering kinetic, hard-hitting, ridiculously gory action scenes with just enough of a tongue-in-cheek attitude to sell even the most ridiculous idea. Before he joins the beehive, however, Tjahjanto is busy with another action movie about a former assassin living an ordinary life in “Nobody 2,” which has Bob Odenkirk returning and is set to be released August 15, 2025.
