Surprise, Cloverfield fans! J.J. Abrams has secretly been working on a sequel, and it comes out in two months.
This shocking news broke after a trailer for 10 Cloverfield Lane was shown in front of 13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi Thursday night. No Cloverfield sequel has ever officially been announced, and we are now suddenly finding out that not only does it exist, but it has already been filmed and is coming out in March.
Paramount Pictures has uploaded the full trailer to their YouTube channel. It takes place entirely inside an underground bunker and follows a young woman who plans an escape.
If you're wondering how on Earth this was kept secret for so long, we have actually heard of this film before under the title Valencia. It was also previously called The Cellar and began production way back in September 2014. As it turns out, these titles were just code names to keep us from figuring out the film's true identity, and producer J.J. Abrams said they wanted to hold back on the reveal for as long as possible.
The plot description for what is now 10 Cloverfield Lane reads:
"The story follows a young woman who wakes up in a cellar after a severe car accident and fears she has been abducted. Her captor, a doomsday prepper, tells her he saved her life and that there has been a terrible chemical attack that has left the outside uninhabitable. She does not know what to believe and as tensions rise, she decides she must escape, regardless of the terrors that await outside.”
So wait, is this actually a proper Cloverfield sequel or not? Since the trailer broke, Abrams told Collider that it's what he calls a "blood relative" of the original. The fact that the whole trailer takes place inside the cellar is causing fans to speculate wildly, though. Is the outside world devastated by the bomb dropped at the end of Cloverfield? Is the monster still running around? Will the film actually explore these questions, or will it take place mainly in the bunker?
Some are even speculating that "Cloverfield" might just become an anthology series with a different sci-fi story every time, but then if that's the case, why intentionally mirror the mysterious launch of the first film's trailer? With all this hype and after years of anticipation of Cloverfield 2, if this story isn't actually very connected, it's going to be a massive disappointment.
10 Cloverfield Lane stars John Goodman, Mary Elizabeth Winstead and John Gallagher Jr. It is directed by Dan Trachtenberg and hits theaters on March 11.