It was confirmed by James Wan himself when he tweeted a funny “Goodman is available, right?? Hmm. #arachnophobia” via his official Twitter account @creepypuppet. The filmmaker, responsible of the SAW and The Conjuring franchises, among many other projects, is going to produce via his company Atomic Monster Productions, and together with Amblin Entertainment, a remake for the popular 1990s film Arachnophobia (1990).
The original Arachnophobia (1990) was directed by Frank Marshall, based on a story by Don Jakoby and Al Williams. In it, a large spider from the jungles of South America is accidentally transported in a crate with a dead body to America where it mates with a local spider. Soon after, the residents of a small California town disappear as the result of spider bites from the deadly spider offspring. It’s up to a couple of doctors with the help of an insect exterminator to annihilate these eight legged freaks before they take over the entire town. The movie, a nice classic that has the essence of other horror sci-fi monster movies of the 1980s and 1990s Pet Sematary (1989) or Night of the Demons (1988), very Creepshow (1982) style, was starred by Jeff Daniels, Harley Jane Kozak, Julian Sands and John Goodman.
All indications point that James Wan won’t write nor direct the movie, since he is quite busy at the moment with the post-production of his upcoming work Aquaman (2018), due to arrive in theaters this December. Besides, it’s been already announced what his next directional job is going to be, the adaptation of Stephen King’s The Tommyknockers. It is yet to announce who is going to be in charge of writing and directing it, or if John Goodman is indeed back to the role of the insect exterminator, so we must stay tuned for further Arachnophobia news!
