Still not over Cloverfield 2? Here’s the state of that long-awaited sequel

Right, let’s talk about Cloverfield—the tiny indie that kicked off with online hype levels not seen since Blair Witch, dropped that head-rolling Statue of Liberty trailer out of nowhere, and left us all clutching for answers about the monster, and even more confused about why there’s still no actual Cloverfield 2 all these years on. Not that we’ve been short of sequels—just none that feel like sequels, have you noticed?

Cloverfield launched in 2008, and despite three films, fans are still waiting for a true, direct sequel.

The Original—and What Could Have Been

The first Cloverfield landed in cinemas on 18 January 2008, riding a tidal wave of genius viral marketing. Found-footage chaos in the shadow of Lost-era mystery boxes and post-9/11 anxiety—it shouldn’t have worked but it just bloody did. J.J. Abrams (Lost, Star Wars) produced, Drew Goddard wrote it, and Matt Reeves (who’s now deep in Batman land) directed. This wasn’t thrown together by amateurs. The budget was a shade over $25 million, it ended up hauling more than $170 million worldwide, and anyone with half a brain would assume a sequel was greenlit the day after.

Instead, all we’ve had for nearly twenty years is rumour, thin hope, and corporately encouraged sleuthing. The original’s viral campaign was half the fun: fake Japanese drinks named Slusho, deep sea ‘nectar’, mysterious drilling companies, environmental protests, and hints that the monster had been sleeping right under us for millennia. All this was made up by the team, but J.J. Abrams at least admitted it was “almost” an origin. The line about the creature being a ‘baby’ still lurks in the fandom’s imagination—what’s not to love about the idea of an irate Clover-mum popping up later?

Sequels? Sort Of

Now, if you expected an actual Cloverfield 2, you’d be forgiven for thinking it surely must have happened by now. Matt Reeves said, even on commentary tracks, there were deliberate gaps and hints from night one of the attack—other handheld cameras, multiple stories, so many doors open for a real sequel. But Hollywood’s favourite trio (Abrams, Reeves, Goddard) got busy. Whenever pressed, they gave bland “only if the story’s right” answers, usually while promoting literally anything else. By 2013, Abrams flat-out admitted to Playboy he was ready to move on, and that waiting for creative lightning was better than forcing a bad follow-up. Which, at the time, was fair enough. Only now it’s 2026 and we’re still waiting to see said lightning.

Enter the Side Quests

• 10 Cloverfield Lane (2016): Originally a standalone script (The Cellar), got hoovered up by Abrams’ Bad Robot, rewritten (by Damien Chazelle, who bailed for Whiplash), became a bunker thriller with John Goodman and Mary Elizabeth Winstead, and late in production was welded into the Cloverfield brand. None of the cast knew it was a Cloverfield *anything* until after filming. Key point here: even Abrams said himself, “this movie is very purposefully not called Cloverfield 2, because it’s not Cloverfield 2.” Still, the trick worked—film pulled $110 million off a tidy $15 million, reviews were strong despite the ‘plug and play’ franchise logic. But for monster fans? Not what we came for.
• The Cloverfield Paradox (2018): Started life as God Particle, again, an unrelated thriller with a sci-fi angle, bought and bodged into the brand. Paramount got nervous about ballooning costs (it went from $5m to $40m), so they dumped it on Netflix for $50 million. Drop a surprise trailer during the Super Bowl, drop the film that same night, and surprise fans with… a film that’s mostly rubbish. Plot: Particle accelerator on a space lab, rips open reality, monsters and dimensional weirdness implied but barely explained. The only direct link is a tacked-on shot of the monster at the end. It was marketed with a bang and forgotten with a whimper.

Everything Else That Wasn’t

Despite every rumour, supposed tie-in, or mysterious viral relaunch, fans are repeatedly strung along:

• Overlord (Nazi horror from Julius Avery): Denied as a sequel by Abrams in 2018, not related after all.
• A Quiet Place (2018): Writers chatted with Paramount about fitting it into the universe—studio wasn’t having it, the film ended up happily on its own.
• Underwater (2020, Kristen Stewart): Also rumoured as an off-brand Cloverfield. It wasn’t.

The one seemingly concrete new attempt came in 2021, with British writer Joe Barton brought on for a new script—promised to not use the old found-footage trick. Directing duties were later given to Babak Anvari. By 2022, Barton clarified to Variety that Abrams was producing, not co-writing, and the current take would probably challenge some fan expectations. Then the long silence started again.

2023: the Slusho.com viral marketing site reappeared, got everyone excited, but turned out to be yet more nothing—bizarrely, it’ll let you invent cold drink flavours and that’s about it. Meanwhile, in June 2024, Barton tweeted he hadn’t been in touch post-writers’ strike, but reckoned someone else was tinkering with the script now. SXSW 2025: Anvari (the apparent director) refused to spill anything concrete except that he 'hoped' we’d see something eventually.

The latest faint glimmer came with The End of Oak Street (starring Ewan McGregor), because Abrams produced and mystery wafted round it, but again, just smoke—if you’re squinting for a connection, you’re inventing it yourself. Same thing with Andrew Patterson (The Vast of Night director), who recently told TheWrap he held talks with Bad Robot about a possible Cloverfield gig, but wants nothing to do with endless ‘development hell’, indicating nothing is close to filming.