“Mallrats” The Series? Yes, Please

June 17, 2016
JACK-BLACKBUSH

Hopefully It Will Go Streaming or Cable

I might be alone when I say this, but I actually enjoyed the movie Mallrats. I know, I know, I’m probably one of the few people who actually enjoyed that Kevin Smith movie. Sure, it’s not Chasing Amy or Clerks, but I thought it was a good movie nonetheless. Now, it looks like Mallrats might be coming to a television near you as a series.

For a long time, Kevin Smith tried to make Mallrats 2, but he had a couple of issues with the studio. According to a recent interview with Preston & Steve Show at WMMR in Philadelphia, Smith thought he could do the film on his own, but it turns out he was wrong.

So I wrote my script, put everything together, and then I was like, ‘I’m ready to go. Do I have to reach out to Universal for approval or something? Or let them pass or whatever?’ And he’s like ‘Yeah, we have to submit the script.’ And I’m like ‘Why do we have to submit the script?’ And he says, ‘Because they own the property and it’s a formality. It’s gonna be fine.’

So we submitted the script, and my agent comes back to me and he goes, ‘Well, apparently Universal has never let a catalog title go. Any title they own, they’ve retained. They’ve never done something where they’ve been like, oh, you can take it back and go make a sequel. Never in the history of the studio.’ And I was like ‘Wait, you told me that was one of my options.’ And he said, ‘Well, apparently I was wrong. So right now there are two options: you make it fully, the studio finances it or you co-finance it with the studio.’

Needless to say, Smith put the idea on the back burner and did some other projects. He directed an episode of the CW show The Flash (which is awesome) and that sort of got him excited about doing television. Now he’s going back and looking to see if he can come up with a way to do Mallrats as a series.

While I’m in that world and space, a couple months ago, we started re-configuring the idea of doing Mallrats not as a film, but as a series. Universal and I are just about to close our deal to do Mallrats the series, and then we take it out into the world and find a home for it. So instead of doing a Mallrats movie, I’m gonna do 10 episodes of a Mallrats series.

I’m all for this and with the right cast and writers Mallrats the series could totally work. While I don’t think Kevin Smith should dawn the trench coat and become Silent Bob again, I do hope they find some way to crash into a dressing room with Joey Lauren Adams changing again. And maybe another three-nippled fortuneteller.