Seeing Kurt Russell reunite with John Carpenter at the latter’s Hollywood Walk of Fame ceremony gives me renewed hope they could finish their Escape from New York trilogy. John Carpenter and Kurt Russell’s movies were perennial rentals for genre fans during the 1980s and 1990s, with the duo working on back-to-back classics like The Thing and Big Trouble in Little China. Sadly, most of their efforts together underperformed upon release and took years to get rediscovered on VHS and television airings.

Carpenter and Russell are my favorite director and actor pairing, with The Thing being my favorite horror movie, period. Escape from New York is my second favorite of their collaborations, with Russell’s Snake Plissken being arguably his most popular character. I’ll admit that lightning didn’t strike twice with the belated sequel Escape from L.A., which played like a sarcastic remake of the original film but with noticeably worse VFX. Carpenter and Russell also planned a third Snake Plissken adventure dubbed Escape from Earth, but L.A.’s failure killed that idea.

Kurt Russell Reuniting With John Carpenter At His Walk Of Fame Ceremony Gives Me Hope For Another Snake Plissken Movie

The Russell and Carpenter chemistry is still there

Carpenter has been criminally underrated among his peers, but his influence has been hard to deny in the last couple of decades. From The Purge franchise to It Follows or Stranger Things, Carpenter’s fingerprints are all over modern genre cinema and television. In April 2025, I was happy to see Carpenter getting some love when he received his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Many of his past collaborators were there too, including The Thing co-stars Keith David and Kurt Russell, who both gave speeches.

Russell’s speech honoring his old friend was especially moving. Seeing Carpenter and Russell together again made me wish they’d reunite for one last movie, and if there was any film I’d wish they’d make, it’s a final Snake Plissken movie. Plot details on Escape from Earth have always been sketchy, though given the bad state Plissken left the planet following the second film’s ending – where he used a doomsday weapon to destroy all technology – it makes sense Snake would want to find a way off it.

Carpenter has also suggested Escape from Earth would have been a proper space movie, which would certainly set it apart from the first two entries. To be clear, I’d take a new Russell/Carpenter joint in any form, but it does feel like they have unfinished business with Snake Plissken.

I Really Want John Carpenter To Direct One Last Movie

Carpenter hasn’t directed a film since 2010’s The Ward

Carpenter worked constantly from the 1970s until the early 2000s, when the failure of sci-fi actioner Ghosts of Mars led him to step back from directing. I was really excited for his 2010 comeback, The Ward, a low-key ghost story set inside a psychiatric hospital during the 1960s. The Ward is a perfectly serviceable horror outing, but from one of the genre’s masters, it couldn’t help but feel underwhelming. It was old school to a fault, and remains one of the few Carpenter films I’ve never returned to.

In the years since, Carpenter hasn’t ruled out a return, but having found a second career as a music artist and composer, he appears more content away from a movie set. That said, in a 2025 Variety chat, Carpenter said, “I would love to direct again, given the right circumstances.” Those circumstances include a decent budget, but he also notes that filmmaking is “the love” of his life. On that note, I’d really love to see Carpenter direct at least one more effort before officially retiring.

Carpenter’s contemporaries like David Cronenberg, Ridley Scott and Michael Mann are still doing strong work in their later careers, and the prospect of working with an icon would no doubt attract a lot of big names to a new Carpenter movie. Throw Kurt Russell (and maybe Snake Plissken) into the mix, it becomes an even more attractive package.

I’d Prefer A Third Russell/Carpenter Movie To An Escape From New York Remake

Maybe the remake should be called Escape from Development Hell

I recently wrote about being relieved the Escape from New York remake isn’t happening. In truth, I’d go see a reboot out of sheer curiosity, just to see what a bigger-budget version looked like. Still, even when names like Gerard Butler, Emily Blunt or Jon Bernthal were being thrown around to play Snake, I couldn’t get excited. To me, Kurt Russell is Snake Plissken, and it’s near impossible to imagine anybody else playing the role.

By the same token, Russell has stated his lack of interest in reviving Snake Plissken for anybody but Carpenter. If there was ever any hope for Escape from Earth ever happening with Russell and Carpenter onboard, that time would be now. It probably won’t happen, but again, any film from Carpenter and Russell would make me happy.

Source: Variety