When it was first announced in 2018 that Rian Johnson was planning to follow his grueling spell as writer and director of Star Wars: The Last Jedi with a murder-mystery named Knives Out, nobody knew quite what to expect.
Johnson was already booked to take on another Star Wars trilogy, one that would sit outside of the existing properties and take on new worlds and new characters. Given the prospect of building a whole new Star Wars franchise over three years, Knives Out had the feel of a palette cleanser for Johnson – who did have some form with the genre on 2005’s clever, quirky drama Brick – before that work got underway.
Expectations changed somewhat when it was revealed that Daniel Craig would be leading the way as Detective Benoit Blanc. Again, Craig’s appearance had the feel of a sudden opportunity. The actor was only free because Danny Boyle had left the production of the new James Bond movie and the shoot date had been pushed back six months. The actor would have some fun playing super sleuth before he got back into training to become 007 once again.
Knives Out was shot in just two months at the end of 2018 with a budget of just $35 million. It gathered together a starry cast, with Chris Evans, Ana de Armas, Jamie Lee Curtis, Michael Shannon, Don Johnson, Toni Collette, Lakeith Stanfield, Katherine Langford, Jaeden Martell, and Christopher Plummer joining Craig.
Upon release, it was a big hit with both critics and audiences., The film grossed over $300 million and scored Johnson an Oscar nomination for Best Original Screenplay.
Suddenly, Johnson’s palette cleanser and Craig’s break before Bond was a serious cinematic proposition. Talk naturally turned to the possibility of a sequel, and, in March 2021, Netflix revealed it had secured not one, but two sequels.
The first sequel is due out at some point in 2022 and we've dug up every piece of information we can find on it.
Release date: Knives Out 2 will be released at some point in 2022.
Cast: Daniel Craig stars as Benoit Blanc. Supporting cast members include Dave Bautista, Edward Norton, Janelle Monáe, Kathryn Hahn and Leslie Odom Jr.
Trailer: there's no trailer yet, but a sneak peek was offered as part of Netflix's 2022 Movie Preview.
What happened in Knives Out?
Knives Out opens with the discovery of the body of Harlan Thrombey (Christopher Plummer) just hours after he had celebrated his 85th birthday with his family in his vast Massachusetts estate.
Thrombey, a wealthy mystery novelist, is found by his housekeeper with his throat slit. The police quickly reach the conclusion that the death is a suicide, but private detective Benoit Blanc (Daniel Craig) is anonymously paid to investigate.
After sitting down with various family members, Blanc quickly discovers that all is not well within the family. Affairs are being had, egos have been bruised and money is being stolen. Things deteriorate further when Thrombey's will is read and, to everyone's shock, his nurse Marta Cabrera (Ana De Armas) is the sole beneficiary.
From there, things ratchet up, the family tries desperately to get Marta to renounce the inheritance with the tactics getting more and more drastic.
All these shenanigans take place under the watchful eye of Craig’s Benoit Blanc, an eccentric Sherlock Holmes-esque sleuth who sees everything and faces down the murderer.
Knives Out 2 release date: what we know
Netflix likes to keep release dates close to its chest, so there’s no confirmed drop date for Knives Out 2 just yet.
However, a recent Variety report indicated that the film was planned to drop at the end of 2022 with the potential of an awards campaign. In response to the article, Netflix wouldn’t be drawn on any release date.
Daniel Craig has also hinted at a release late in the year, with the actor telling his Skyfall co-star Javier Bardem in Variety: “It’s in the can. Rian [Johnson] is editing now, and it’ll be out, I think, in the fall of this year.”
So filming is complete, with Johnson confirming that production had finished in the middle of September 2021.
Unlike the first movie, which was shot entirely in Massachusetts, the sequel has more of a global feel, with production having taken place for a month on the island of Spetses, Greece as well as in New York City and Serbia.
Knives Out 2 cast: who is in?
Aside from Daniel Craig, none of the key cast from Knives Out will return. There’s no room for Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who starred in Johnson’s Brick and Loop and collaborated with the director on his TV variety series. Maybe he’s saving him for the third film? Who knows?
Much like the original, the new cast is a very starry list, with only Madelyn Cline and Jessica Henwick relative unknowns.
Cline has had small roles in Stranger Things and The Originals and is one of the leading lights in Netflix’s teen drama Outer Banks. Henwick was first announced with a key role in Netflix’s Marvel collaboration Iron Fist. After a big role in The Matrix: Resurrections, Henwick not only has a part in the Knives Out sequel, she’s also in Netflix’s other tentpole, The Gray Man.
The key Knives Out 2 cast looks like this:
- Daniel Craig as Detective Benoit Blanc
- Dave Bautista
- Edward Norton
- Janelle Monáe
- Kathryn Hahn
- Leslie Odom Jr.
- Kate Hudson
- Madelyn Cline
- Jessica Henwick
- Ethan Hawke
As yet, we don’t know which characters this new cast will be playing. Ethan Hawke has revealed that his role is a small one, telling Screen Rant: “Knives Out 2, I just have a cameo in that movie. Don't expect much from me.”
We caught a glimpse of six cast members, including Hahn, Hudson and Bautista, in the first preview, which is below:
Knives Out 2 trailer – is there one?
There’s no standalone trailer for Knives Out 2 just yet, but we did get a small preview of the film as part of Netflix’s preview of all their 2022 movies. Skip to minute 2:34 for a very quick glimpse of Craig in action as he prepares to board a boat…
You can expect a full trailer to drop in the weeks before the release date, but, as we said, there’s no confirmation on when that will be.
Knives Out 2: who is making it?
Rian Johnson acts as writer, director and producer on the sequel and he has recruited many of the same people who helped make the first film such a success.
Cinematographer Steve Yedlin, who has worked with Johnson on all of his films, going all the way back to Brick, has once again been at the wheel, while Nathan Johnson is back to compose the score.
Likewise, Johnson’s producing partner Ram Bergman and editor Bob Ducsay, who first worked with Johnson on the hit sci-fi drama Looper, are back on the crew for the sequel.
Knives Out 2 – how much did Netflix pay?
A pretty penny indeed.
Back in March 2021 when the deal was announced, it was revealed that the streamer had agreed to pay $469 million for the rights to two sequels. That’s a staggering amount of money, which will reportedly see Daniel Craig earn more than $100 million by the time he’s completed work on the third film. That windfall is the highest salary ever paid by a streamer. It’s double what The Rock has managed to land for Amazon’s forthcoming festive adventure Red One.
Both Amazon and Apple had worked hard to persuade Johnson to sign up with them for the Knives Out sequels, but in the end, they balked at the final price.
One of the losing bidders told Variety: “The math doesn’t work. There’s no way to explain it. The world has gone mad. It’s a mind-boggling deal.”
Netflix, though, are happy with the deal, with an insider telling the Hollywood Reporter: “Yes, it’s overpaying, but Netflix is playing chess while everyone else is playing checkers,” says one streaming executive familiar with the deal. “It takes a proven theatrical commodity off the board and puts it in their pocket. And it’s another way they re-educate audiences to think of streaming and their company above a studio.”
What can we expect from Knives Out 2?
The plot is under wraps, but the cast members have been lining up to extol the film’s virtues.
Dave Bautista gushed about the sequel, telling People magazine: “I really think it’s going to be as good, if not better, than the first one. I’m always afraid to say that because I don’t want anybody to get offended saying that we’re going to be better, but I really do think this. I think the characters are just so much more colorful. I think people are really going to dig this.”
He went on: “The characters are just so great. They’re so different. Everybody’s cast so well. I was working with a couple of my castmates and was mesmerized by their performances and just how well they’ve adapted into these characters. I think the characters in this are even more quirky than the first one.”
Knives Out 3 – what do we know?
We know it’ll happen, Netflix has shelled out enough money to make sure of that, and we know that Daniel Craig and Rian Johnson are confirmed. But, beyond that, we’ve got nothing, no production start date or hint of a release date. When we get closer to Knives Out 2’s release date, and the cast and Johnson start doing interviews, we will know a lot more.
Knives Out 2 will be released on Netflix in 2022.
English
Arabic
Belarusian
Bengali
Bosnian
Bulgarian
Chinese (Simplified)
Croatian
Czech
Danish
Dutch
Estonian
Filipino
Finnish
French
Georgian
German
Greek
Gujarati
Hausa
Hebrew
Hindi
Hmong
Hungarian
Igbo
Indonesian
Italian
Japanese
Javanese
Kazakh
Korean
Kurdish (Kurmanji)
Kyrgyz
Lao
Latvian
Lithuanian
Macedonian
Malagasy
Norwegian
Persian
Polish
Portuguese
Punjabi
Romanian
Russian
Serbian
Slovak
Slovenian
Spanish
Swedish
Thai
Turkish
Ukrainian
Vietnamese
Yoruba