Movies
“It’s Jaws With a Moose”: Kevin Smith Says ‘Moose Jaws’ May Still Be Happening
As you may recall, Kevin Smith‘s original plan was that Tusk and Yoga Hosers would be the first two films in a Canada-set “True North Trilogy,” with the third film set to be a Jaws spoof titled Moose Jaws. It’s now been right around three years since we’ve written up any kind of update for Moose Jaws and the reason why is simple: we haven’t been provided with one.
At this point, we had assumed that the long stretch of radio silence meant that Moose Jaws had probably fallen apart and wouldn’t be happening, but Smith has now offered some hope!
He commented during an online Q&A session last week, “Moose Jaws is the movie I’m doing that’s Jaws but with a moose instead of a shark. It’s so weird that you bring it up. We have a phone call about it with some of the folks that we made Reboot with next week. A conference call. So yeah, it may be bubbling back to life. Wouldn’t that be nice? Head up to the Canadian outdoors, spread far apart from everybody, making movies. One day, when we’re allowed to do that sort of thing again. So yeah, movement on Moose Jaws!”
Smith had said at Sundance back in 2016, “Moose Jaws is like, it’s my favorite thing I’ve ever written. This is a fuckin’ fan film. This is like pouring my heart out on a page. I love Jaws, and I love Canada, and I combined the two of them. So the whole thing is beat-for-beat Jaws, up until the third act. In the third act it becomes Godzilla, Destroy All Monsters, Star Trek 2: The Wrath of Khan, and ends with Return of the Jedi. It’s pretty magical.”
“Justin [Long] returns as Tusk,” he added, “and he fights Moose Jaws.” We hear Jay and Silent Bob will also appear in the film, as will the two main characters from Yoga Hosers.
Judging from the unprecedented box office success of Kane Parsons’ Backrooms adaptation, you’ve likely already seen the liminal horror hit that managed to make audiences afraid of empty hallways and bad wallpaper. And now that so many of us have already entered the yellow labyrinth (some of us more than once), the time has come to discuss the spoiler-filled details that make the movie so fascinating in the first place.
And if there’s one element here that makes the Backrooms movie stand out from any previous lore/mythology, it has to be the genius addition of the Still Life entities. Warped recreations of real people that somehow wandered into the Complex, these misremembered creatures are responsible for some of the most disturbing imagery of 2026 – as well as laugh-out-loud memes created by one of the film’s very own concept artists.
However, true to Parsons’ word that the movie would rely heavily on practical effects, each of these distorted monsters was brought to life by real actors under heavy layers of makeup and prosthetics (with the occasional splash of CGI enhancements). While Anora and If I Had Legs I’d Kick You actress Ivy Wolk wasn’t among these performers, despite what Letterboxd might have you believe, the creature cast did benefit from veteran players with plenty of genre experience.
For starters, Alien: Romulus alumni Robert Bobroczkyi (who previously brought that film’s horrific Offspring to life during its most memorable sequence) plays the flick’s main antagonist, the Still Life version of Captain Clark. And though there was some obvious CGI involved in making the character’s peg-leg and nightmarish face more believable, Bobroczkyi’s monstrous performance and his natural 7’7″ frame helped to make that final chase sequence a clear highlight among this year’s genre offerings.
The film’s Texas-Chain-Saw-inspired “dinner” scene also features a freaky collection of less-aggressive Still Life creatures in the form of the Bearded Man, the Red-Headed Woman and, strangest of them all, the cheekily named “Archibald Leland Sutter Still Life” (who earned this title among fans and crewmembers as a reference to his apparent affinity for lamps).
While this was the first major horror outing for both Patrick Baynham (The Bearded Man) and Dana Mahmood (Archibald), Rhiannon Roberts has worked as a stunt performer in everything from Yellowjackets to HBO’s The Last of Us adaptation – which is probably why The Red-Headed Woman is the most active out of Clark’s impromptu “family.” That being said, the Archibald Leland Sutter Still Life is my personal favorite of the bunch simply because his anachronistic outfit suggests that the Backrooms phenomenon might be a lot older than the Async Foundation. I also love how hard he tries to be helpful with that little light of his!
That might be it for the Still Life entities, but I think horror fans will also be pleased to hear that the film’s Found Footage prologue stars none other than Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City star Avan Jogia as Naren Warne – and American Mary herself Katharine Isabelle also shows up in a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it cameo at Mary’s house party towards the middle of the story (though I have a feeling that she originally had a bigger part that was likely cut for time).
At the end of the day, Parsons’ Backrooms may have been an auteur-driven project motivated by the young director’s unique take on the classic creepypasta, but film has always been a collective artform, so it’s fun to see just how many talented performers it takes to bring this kind of supernatural nightmare to life in a way that connects with so many people.
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