By Corey Bennett
The first Real Steel movie was a hit, earning a 7.1/10 rating. It was an amazing movie for its time in regards to the CGI that it used, and the story is just a work of art. The movie was released in 2011, with it hitting almost $300 million at the box office. Clearly, the best idea would have been to try and make a second movie. Sadly, that was not the case. But why is that?
Real Steel was actually based on the short story Steel, written by Richard Matheson. Action star Hugh Jackson is the lead character of the movie, while the movie itself was directed and produced by Shawn Levy. The movie was loved everywhere it was seen because it introduced a new concept that people had never seen before: mixing technology with real-life sports.
The robots seen in Real Steel were actually motion-captured. This allowed the actors to perform the robot movements before they were later put into CGI. This technique gave the robots a more realistic feel to the fights between them, which made the movie much more entertaining for the audience. To make it even better, Hugh Jackman trained rigorously for his role in Real Steel, going through intense physical training and even learning boxing skills to prepare for his role as the retired boxer and now robot boxing trainer, Charlie Kenton. This added even more to the authenticity of this movie.
When the movie was originally released, it was expected to flop. But instead of that, it was amazing. The movie was not only loved in the United States but was loved worldwide. The visual effects, the storyline, and Hugh Jackman’s performance made this movie great. It can also be seen that it was a great movie simply because of things that students at Benicia High School have said, with one student saying, “It was a great movie, that showed a good father-son relationship and also showed an amazing representation of an underdog story.”
However, when rumors started arising about a sequel being made, they were quickly shot down by the director, Shawn Levy, who said that there really was no need for a second movie.
“I really try not to make sequels that don’t deserve to be. And it’s why I didn’t move forward with the Real Steel sequel because I didn’t feel we had a second movie that could match or top the first,” he said in an interview with Collider. For those who don’t know Collider, it is a news site that often focuses on entertainment news, analysis, and commentary.
In another interview, Levy shared some of his conversations with Hugh Jackson on the topic of there being a Real Steel 2. At the time of this interview, Levy was working on his next upcoming film, Free Guy, featuring Ryan Reynolds as the main character. Levy shared that all of his older movies were receiving lots of love, including one movie that he had made with Hugh Jackman. He then stated that he was now considering a sequel.
“Well, I’ll say this: Hugh and I definitely are feeling it; we’ve never stopped feeling the love for Real Steel, and it’s almost like the volume has been increasing. Hugh and I were literally together last week talking about that, so I would never say never on that, a sequel to Real Steal. Additionally, I’m friends with Hugh. I’m friends with Ryan. I will get them together. Whether it’s in Real Steel or another movie, I will direct those two amazing guys and dear friends in a movie together.”
To some extent, he did keep his word on that with his new upcoming film, Deadpool 3, which features both Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman in the lead roles.
As of now, though there is sadly nothing new in regards to there being a new Real Steel movie, it is always still a possibility.
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