Anyone who's wandered into a Waffle House at 3 AM knows you're basically rolling the dice on what kind of wild stuff you're going to witness.
That late-night chaos is getting dialed up to 100 in The Waffle House Index, an upcoming sci-fi flick that just locked in Obsession breakout Inde Navarrette to star.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, the logline for the film reads, "The Waffle House Index is an informal barometer of a hurricane’s severity. The levels are based on how much service an area’s Waffle House, a chain that basically operates 24/7, is offering. Green means the restaurant is in full service mode and the damage isn’t severe; yellow means a limited menu, indicating low food supplies; and red is just bad news, a closed restaurant and a sign of unsafe conditions."
The synopsis continues, "Jane, a Waffle House waitress whose already bad day gets worse when a stranger with a gun shows up during her night shift. What happens after involves a mass flood, killer crocodiles, a nuclear explosion, a magical bunker under the Waffle House, and aliens."
Penned by Andrew Nunnelly (Doolittle) and set to be directed by Louis Paxton (Ladybaby), the script originally turned heads on the 2025 Black List; Hollywood’s annual roundup of the industry's favorite unproduced screenplays.
Brad Pitt’s Plan B Entertainment is producing the thriller, which was recently snapped up by Apple Original Films.
Initial reviews described the script as an absolute fever dream that cranks up the sci-fi craziness with every passing scene.
The twist, though, is that the film is also a raw character study about Jane, a grieving waitress who loses her mother to cancer the morning of her graveyard shift, only to end up fighting for survival against all kinds of apocalyptic nightmares.
Whether Apple decides to lean into that weird contrast or iron out the kinks before production remains to be seen.
Navarette most recently signed on to play Rogue in Marvel Studios' upcoming X-Men reboot, and it's currently unknown if she will film The Waffle House Index first or begin her superhero career.
Also on the Superman & Lois alum's docket is Invertigo, which is described as a high-tension thriller about a group of teenagers trapped hundreds of feet in the air after a mechanical failure on a roller coaster.