Maybe it was the leak that saw The Expendables 3 viewed by millions weeks before it hit theaters, but Sylvester Stallone's action bonanza (clearly the best of the franchise) tanked hard at the box office..domestically, anyway. Internationally it was a powerhouse, with more than $160M of its $204M total coming from overseas markets. And while there is still some buzz of a fourth film, what's likely to come first is the female-led spinoff, The Expendabelles, and some new names are being rumored for the cast.
Now take all of this with a shot of side eye because the story emerged at The Tracking Board, which says offers have been sent to Naomi Watts, Alan Rickman (?), Chris Evans (??), Marcia Gay Harden, and Li Bingbing. They also "confirm" that Sylvester Stallone and Bruce Willis will be reprising their Expendables roles, which sounds suspicious given the blow up between the two during The Expendables 3 filming. Remember how Willis walked out on production because of a salary dispute, only to have Stallone rewrite the script and trash his character for the entire movie? Yeah. And with Stallone producing Expendebelles it doesn't seem likely he'd be begging Willis to return.
Anyway, we'll see if any of this shakes out. These are just offers and any of them could (and probably will) refuse, just as Meryl Streep and Sigourney Weaver did. Robert Luketic (Killers) is directing from a script by the Legally Blonde duo of Karen McCullah Lutz and Kirsten Smith.
