So It Looks Like Space Jam 2 Starring LeBron James Is Actually Happening
THR- In his first project since directing the record-breaking Black Panther, Ryan Coogler is teaming with LeBron James on the long-anticipated follow-up to the Michael Jordan-Bugs Bunny hit Space Jam, The Hollywood Reporter has learned. Coogler will produce the new Space Jam movie and Terence Nance, who created HBO’s Random Acts of Flyness and directed the experimental film The Oversimplification of Her Beauty, will direct. Production on the Warner Bros. film is tentatively slated for 2019, during the NBA off-season. It will be James’ first starring role after a successful turn as a supporting character in the 2015 Amy Schumer comedy Trainwreck.
I could complain about how lame it is that LeBron is making a sequel for Space Jam instead of trying something different and fresh. But I won’t for a few reasons.
1. I still have a nostalgia boner from this morning’s announcement that Sony is bringing back the Playstation 1 in miniature form in a moneygrab to take advantage of my generation’s yearning for the past when we weren’t so washed and life wasn’t so shitty. So I can’t really hate on LeBron and SpringHill Entertainment for looking to tap into the same weird part of our brains that gets us hyped for sequels. I’m sure Ryan Coogler will do a fine job with a movie that already has a blueprint written since it’s a sequel and he turned a hero like Black Panther, that wasn’t exactly moving comic books back when I was a youth, into a fucking MONSTER at the box office that blew Vinny Chase’s Aquaman out of the water. And while I know it’s a longshot, I would love if LeBron did some self-aware stuff and subtweeted Bugs Bunny during a game or threatened to work out with Dwyane Wade at halftime of the game vs. The Monstars.
2. The mere thought of the people that actually #debate MJ vs. LeBron completely seriously arguing about who had a better acting performances in a movie starring the fucking Looney Tunes makes me cackle.
3. Lola Bunny made me feel things that no adolescent human child should feel about a cartoon bunny rabbit. She was Margaery Tyrell looooooong before Marge was giving her rose out to any man with a claim to the Iron Throne.
On second thought I’m gonna cross out that last paragraph.
3. The soundtrack. Space Jam may be a good, clean, fun movie to have on in the background and cash in some throwback feels. But the soundtrack was the true legend of the entire project with heavy hitters like R. Kelly, LL Cool J, Method Man, The Quad City motherfucking DJs. And of course the most underrated songbird of our generation, Monica.
With LeBron being the big music fan he is (Source: His Instagram every single time a new song comes out) as well as the new King of LA (outside of the crazy Kobe Stans renegade state located somewhere in the Elephant’s grave yard of Los Angeles), I feel like there is a 99.9999% chance the Space Jam 2 soundtrack will bring nothing short of a raging fire album full of bangers unheard since the OG Space Jam soundtrack.
Click in upper-left hand corner to choose any song from the full soundtrack
So while there is plenty of reasons to clown this movie for being a clone of a movie by the ghost LeBron chases every season, I will not be the person to write that blog. I’m actually pretty sure Portnoy will. But not me. However, if LeBron sullies the good name of Space Jam soundtracks, he will have made an enemy out of me for life.
But instead of worrying about if a bunch of people in Hollywood will fuck a sequel up yet again, I’ll just listen to the Mickstape x Lights Camera Barstool collabo breaking down the good, the great, and the awesome of Space Jam 1 and hope the soundtrack gets 5 mics from The Source*.
*If The Source is still a thing. If it’s not, someone should definitely relaunch it because the nostalgia train doesn’t appear to be dying anytime soon