It’s been six years since last we heard about a Tucker and Dale Vs Evil sequel and it’s looking more and more like it’s never going to happen.
Fifteen years ago, the world was introduced to Tucker and Dale, played by Tyler Labine and Alan Tudyk, two down on their luck everymen who suddenly became embroiled in a story full of dismembered teens and laugh-out-loud shenanigans and, honestly, it’s a Halloween favourite with fans ever since.
So much so that, for all these years, we’ve held out hope that we’d see the duo back for more gory fun, with Labine saying in 2019: “I can’t really tell you much, but we’re in development with a couple things right now. Things are looking pretty good.
“Alan and I are both still on board, along with Eli. We’re just trying to line up a few pieces. It’s just a matter of timing. We’re going to get something to the fans, because that’s really the only reason we want to do it. No one’s getting rich off this thing. Alan and I have always been like, ‘Whatever we do has to be for the people that stuck with it and made it what it is.’ That’s all the fans. Hopefully something will come to fruition.”
Alas, six years later and we’re still waiting to hear more and now director and co-writer Eli Craig has shed some light on just why that is.
“Honestly, Tucker & Dale 2 has died more deaths than the college kids in Tucker & Dale,” he says, “We’ve had so many versions that have almost got off its feet or, for one reason or another, have gotten killed. It really does set us back that people can’t look at the box office, the actual box office, of the movie.”
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However, the evil that got the better of our hapless heroes seems to be none other than Warner Bros Discovery CEO David Zaslav who killed a Tucker and Dale TV series, which just might be what Labine was talking about in 2019.
“We almost did a TV show with it that was on TNT/TBS, and you’ll be happy to know that David Zaslav, the slayer of all cinema, came in and put the final nail in the coffin for Tucker & Dale as we were about to go to series, and just cancelled all production.”
Aghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!
The series was set to have both Tudyk and Labine return as detectives “stupidly trying to figure out what’s happening in a world where they’re always getting it wrong and people are dying around them”.
However, wonderfully, Craig, who is currently being celebrated for his new horror Clown in a Cornfield, still is holding on to seeing more of Tucker and Dale: “I’ve never completely let go of the idea we’d make a sequel,” he says, “and part of the reason people want to see a sequel is because it’s set up for it. Tucker & Dale, when I wrote it, there were these elements I wanted to follow, like Chad is still alive, Allison and Dale’s story. So I always wanted to do a sequel, but Hollywood is a slayer of great ideas.
“But stay alive, fans! Because there’s always a possibility.”
Tucker and Dale is one of those instant fan favourites, fitting into lists that usually include Evil Dead III, Bubba Ho-Tep, Ghostbusters, Tremors, Big Trouble in Little China and more movies you love to watch on those dark, stormy nights. It’s gory but it’s silly and it’s fun, giving the world two loveable anti-heroes in Tucker and Dale, who we will always feel a connection with and always root for.
Well, we’re still here, hoping for more…
Thoughts? I know you have ’em and I wanna hear them all!
Marc
Marc is a self-confessed nerd. Ever since seeing Star Wars for the first time around 1979 he’s been an unapologetic fan of the Wars and still believes, with Clone Wars and now Underworld, we are yet to see the best Star Wars. He’s a dad of two who now doesn’t have the time (or money) to collect the amount of toys, comics, movies and books he once did, much to the relief of his long-suffering wife. In the real world he’s a graphic designer. He started Following the Nerd because he was tired of searching a million sites every day for all the best news that he loves and decided to create one place where you can go to get the whole lot. Secretly he longs to be sitting in the cockpit of his YT-1300 Corellian Transport ship with his co-pilot Chewie, roaming the universe, waiting for his next big adventure, but feels just at home watching cartoons with his kids….
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