David Fincher is making a Once Upon A Time in Hollywood sequel for Netflix with Brad Pitt set to return

LovabledanielsApril 2, 202529 Views

David Fincher, Brad Pitt and Quentin Tarantino are working on a sequel to Tarantino’s Oscar-winning Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood, and they’re making it for Netflix.

That’s according to Variety, which says that the project doesn’t yet have an official title.

It’s “an especially unique production,” Variety says: not only is Fincher helming the sequel to another high-profile director’s movie, but it’s moving from a theatrical studio to a streamer. The first movie was released by Sony Pictures in 2019.

What to expect from the Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood sequel

(Image credit: Sony Pictures Releasing)

Brad Pitt will be returning to the role of Cliff Booth, one of the two main protagonists in the original movie, and with Fincher directing it’s a bit of an old pals’ act: the two worked together on Fight Club, Se7en and The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. However, Variety doesn’t expect Leonardo DiCaprio to return, and Margot Robbie is unlikely too.

The backstory here is a little complicated. Quentin Tarantino set out to write what he said would be his tenth and final movie, The Movie Critic, but in early 2024 it was reported that that film had evolved into two movies – and that one of them was a spin-off from Once Upon a Time. However, both movies were then reportedly scrapped in April 2024 as The Hollywood Reporter published a fascinating feature, ‘How Quentin Tarantino’s ‘The Movie Critic’ Fell Apart’.

According to THR: “The project initially focused on a writer working for a fictional porn magazine in the late 1970s and then it quietly evolved, amid a flurry of rewrites, into something resembling a spinoff of his ninth film, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (with some potential meta twists, as we’ll explain later).”

And now, as The Playlist puts it, “it’s all just flipped upside down”. “Tarantino must have loved the script and didn’t want it to languish in a drawer because sources close to the filmmakers tell us he approached Fincher, and Netflix has quietly put together the deal, which will probably end up being around a $200 million budget to shoot in California this July – yep, it’s being fast-tracked and happening fast, meaning we’ll get additional casting soon.”

In the meantime, you can watch Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood on Netflix.