Keanu Reeves will return to a fan-favorite role. Fans will get to see Reeves as exorcist/demonologist John Constantine after 17 years since the original hit theaters. The supernatural thriller will reunite Reeves with original director Francis Lawrence. The sequel to the 2005 cult favorite film Constantine is in the works.
For the inexperienced, the original film, which is based on DC’s Hellblazer comics, follows Constantine through his cursed existence battling evil demons. The film grossed over $200 million worldwide upon its release. Akiva Goldsman will write the script and produce the project through Weed Road Pictures, along with Bad Robot’s JJ Abrams and Hannah Minghella, according to Deadline.
Reeves always shared his hopes of one day returning to the role of the trenchcoat-wearing hero. In a conversation with Stephen Colbert last year, he said that Constantine was at the top of his list of characters he would love to return to. “I would love to be John Constantine again,” he said, adding, “I’ve tried.”
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During a 15th anniversary panel at San Diego Comic-Con, Goldsman said that they had been trying for years to make a sequel to Constantine, but the studio said the box office earnings didn’t justify it. “We wanted to do a hard-R sequel,” he said at the time. “I think we would probably get there tomorrow. Yeah, we tried a lot of different ways to find… it was always for the studios that did it, which was Village Roadshow and Warner Bros.”
The actor went on to say, “He was always a bit like a feathered fish.” Reeves, whose acting career spans four decades, most recently appeared in DC League of Super-Pets as the voice of Batman, The Matrix Resurrections as Neo, and Bill & Ted Face the Music as Ted. Reeves is also currently an executive producer on John Wick: Chapter 4, in which he also plays the title role, and recently produced the film Gone and the short film Salacia. His next role, however, will be something new for the movie star, a leading role on television.