Weapons Prequel Gets A Title And A Writer

Oscar winner Amy Madigan will return as evil suburban witch Gladys as the Weapons prequel moves ahead.

There was already a prequel to Zach Cregger‘s Weapons in development when Amy Madigan won a richly deserved Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her incredibly performance as the ruthless suburban witch, Aunt Gladys. The film grossed $2770 million against a budget of $38 million, after all, so some kind of spin off was almost guaranteed to happen. But it’s fun to imagine that the project got moved up a few rungs following Oscar night, even if we’ll never know.

But now, thanks to Deadline, comes the news that the prequel to Weapons now has both a writer and a working title. The writer is Zach Shields (Krampus, Godzilla Vs Kong, Godzilla: King Of The Monsters), who’ll be joining Weapons writer and director Zach Cregger in penning the script, giving us two Zachs for the price of one. The title – for now, at least – is Gladys, after Madigan’s unspeakably creepy child murderer.

And that’s all we know for now. Cregger had pretty much confirmed before now that the prequel would be about Aunt Gladys, but the working title locks it in. Whether or not we’ll be getting an origin story is still up for grabs though. I’m pretty much in the “more you know the less scary it is” camp for the most part, but Cregger hasn’t steered us wrong yet.

Besides, Aunt Gladys is clearly a freshly-minted horror icon. Speaking to Deadline about the character’s appeal, Madigan said, “This is a woman who knows what she has to do, and she does it. Now, granted, some of her methods might be a little unusual. But she has that, and I think all women in our business should have more of that confidence, myself included. So if I can take that away from it, I’ll say this is a win for Aunt Gladys and for me.” Absolute queen.