The Invisible Man proved to be a massive critical and commercial hit for Universal when it released in theaters back in 2020, and it wasn't long before reports began to circulate that director Leigh Whannell was set to return to helm a sequel, tentatively titled The Invisible Woman.
Unfortunately, the follow-up never materialized (no pun intended), and Whannell explained why plans for a second film fell through during a recent interview with THR.
"With Invisible Man, you talked about the track 'Denouement,' and because I love that note that the film ended on, I can’t imagine gluing more story onto that. Sequels are mostly driven by the economics of Hollywood. 'We scored, we did well, and let’s do it again. Let’s get them back there.' And I’ve been a front-row viewer of that. I have also written two movies [Saw and Insidious] that have turned into long-running franchises with varying degrees of artistic success. I’m not going to pretend that every movie in the Saw franchise is... That film has become its own beast, and I sit outside of it now."
"I was so happy with Invisible Man’s ending that I just don’t feel the artistic need to go forward with it. The financial need is something different. The studio might look at that and say, 'Well, we feel like it should keep going because we want to make more money.' But on an artistic level, I’m like, 'That’s a nice closed door there. Let’s just leave it closed.'"
Reading between the lines, it seems the studio may have been keen to forge ahead with a sequel that Whannell wasn't entirely on board with, and it doesn't sound like he has much interest in returning now.
Even so, we may still get another movie at some point.
While speaking to Screen Rant, star Elizabeth Moss revealed that she still wants to make a sequel, and is "working on" getting the project into development.
"It was out for two weeks before COVID and made hundreds of millions of dollars. We could have easily just churned out a sequel and thrown it up on streaming and called it a day, and I think some people would've made money off of that. I am so grateful to Universal and Blum for not doing that and for having a standard that's unusual in these circumstances and really wanting it to be worth doing. So it's an unusual thing, but that doesn't usually happen. But I feel like it's important.
We love that movie so much. The people who made it – we're so proud of it. We really want to make sure [that] if we do a sequel, it's worthy and it's going to have to be as good if not better. So that's been kind of what's slowed us down. But I don't think that's a bad thing. I think if we're going to do it, it's got to be right. But we still want to do it. We're still working on it. We just have to get the right script together."
Though Moss' comments have been misinterpreted by some (she's not actually "working on the movie" yet), this does at least suggest that she would be down to reprise her role as Cecilia should the opportunity arise.
The first movie concluded with Cecilia turning the tables on her psychotic ex, and the implication that she may continue to use his invisibly tech, possibly as some sort of vigilante.
The question is, would fans be interested in a sequel to The Invisible Man without Whannell in the director's chair?