I don’t know, it’s the internet. Aren’t Wicker Man quotes what we’re all supposed to be striving for?

In any event, though the Expendables 2 stopped about $15m short of the first film’s domestic total, the franchise has proved it’s a grower on the worldwide front (from $171m to $205m internationally) and that the general enthusiasm for it was not a one-off fluke. This ensures that Stallone will be free to keep assembling action icons for at least another few films he if he likes.

The director has already been speaking on the prospect and tossing out names that he hopes to see sign up for the next go-round, and has just confirmed that one of them has already done so: Nicholas Cage.

The news comes from a spanish newspaper, but it’s also been reposted on Sly’s (seemingly real?) Facebook page. What’s odd is that the translation makes it seem like the actor posts in the same stroked-out, nonsensical mumble  that he speaks in. Regardless, the announcement also comes with some foreshadowing of exactly who Stallone is going after.

We are preparing the film with the same passion and commitment as the previous two. We have confirmed Nicolas Cage, a master actor who gives a veneer intellectual group. Hopefully we can realize to Harrison Ford, Wesley Snipes and Mickey Rourke. That is the great mission of the producer. We will continue with the same narrative scheme, the agility and the frenzy, which are inherent to the saga. What will definitely be the last? I can not guarantee. In principle it would be two deliveries, but the affection of the people encouraged us to work on a third. I guess as long as we amused ourselves by offering fun and people, we can continue playing ‘The Expendables’. For now we are not as expendable as it should and as some critics want.

Mickey Rourke back, eh? I guess that’s precisely as likely to happen as however in debt Rourke has gotten himself in 2012. As for Snipes, this sequel would be a good way for the actor to get himself back on the big screen, while Harrison Ford wouldn’t seem to want or need such a thing. Who knows, especially when Stallone just tossing names out off-the-cuff is being churned through a messy translation. Not to mention- some of these old men are flakier than a tween making Friday night plans, so don’t believe anything until the cameras roll.

All that said, Nicholas Cage will be a welcome streak of genuine crazy to the Expendables‘ world of perfectly serviceable action.

Or yeah, sure, a “veneer of intellectualism” or whatever.

 

via Collider and Indiewire