It’s now been four years since the release of Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, the long awaited feature film adaptation of the ’80s/’90s books written by Alvin Schwartz. The film was a success at the box office for Lionsgate, scaring up $104 million worldwide, so why haven’t we gotten a sequel yet? A follow-up was announced, but to date hasn’t come to fruition.

Speaking with IGN this week, André Øvredal (The Last Voyage of the Demeter) confirms that Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark 2 is still in active development at this time.

Øvredal tells IGN, “We have a story. We have a script. We’ve been working on the script as late as last year and even slightly into this year.

“The process obviously stopped with the strike — but it’s alive, for sure. COVID and then [Demeter] eating up two years of my life certainly put a dent in the progress.”

Last we heard, André Øvredal (The Autopsy of Jane Doe) is returning to direct the follow-up film, with Dan Hageman and Kevin Hageman also returning to write the script.

Guillermo del Toro is once again also involved, reportedly with a “story by” credit.

The first film adapted horror tales from Alvin Schwartz’s three Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark books, bringing Stephen Gammell’s terrifying illustrations to life for the first time. Presumably, the sequel will be pulling from other tales in those books, but will it continue the wraparound storyline from the first movie or take things in a new direction entirely?

The first film ended with Zoe Colletti’s heroine Stella Nicholls vowing to save her missing friends, taken by the various Gammell-inspired creatures unleashed throughout the film.