Spoiler Warning: Everything Everywhere All at Once
As of late, the multiverse has been incredibly popular in mainstream films. It has been heavily explored in the Marvel universe, most recently in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, a multiversal romp filled with CGI lasers and massive monsters. While it’s fun to see such intriguing scientific ideas explored in mainstream films, there are many fascinating possibilities when the multiverse is explored in cinema. At the end of the day, a Marvel movie will be limited in its exploration of the multiverse by the necessity of spending considerable screen time on its massive roster of celebrity talent.
MOVIEWEB VIDEO OF THE DAY
However, the multiverse exploring film genre recently got a colorful, unique addition: Everything Everywhere All at Once. Despite its glaring flaw of not being involved with a superhero cinematic universe of any kind, the comedy-action film was a massive success. It was A24’s highest-grossing film of all time, grossing nearly $100 million against its $25 million budget, and it was well-received by both critics and audiences.
The film stars Michelle Yeoh (Tomorrow Never Dies, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon) as Evelyn, a loving yet cold mother to Stephanie Hsu’s (The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings) Joy Wang and an inattentive wife to Ke Huy Quan’s (Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, The Goonies) Waymond Wang. Given how successful the weird and wonderful Everything Everywhere All at Once was, could there be a sequel?
Evelyn Wang: Master of the Multiverse
Everything Everywhere All at Once would have been nothing without its titular character Evelyn Wang and the excellent performance of the actor who portrayed her, Michelle Yeoh. In stark opposition to the essentially omnipotent heroes who gallivant through the multiverse in Marvel films, Evelyn is a deeply flawed character. She has a strained relationship with her daughter Joy, and her marriage to the incessantly supportive Waymond is all but over by the time the events of the film begin.
RELATED: Everything Everywhere All At Once: Every Version of Evelyn Wang, Ranked
Evelyn Wang is an everyman, a humble laundromat owner with bills to pay and taxes to ignore. When Everything Everywhere All at Once starts going off the rails, her character is as bewildered as the audiences watching the film. At the end of the film, Evelyn Wang has essentially become a master of the multiverse, and it would be interesting to see what filmmakers could do with a fully realized Evelyn in a theoretical sequel.
Multiverse Madness: Going Beyond the Hot Dog Fingers
A potential Everything Everywhere All at Once sequel would undoubtedly work due to the fact that the multiverse is literally infinite. This gives the film’s creators tons of possibilities when it comes to writing a new and exciting storyline. The film’s audiences, who sat through such insane alternate reality exploits as the hot dog finger reality, pictured above, would undoubtedly be on board for another film that could introduce a whole new batch of unique universes.
RELATED: How Everything Everywhere All At Once Bridges the Gap Between Summer Blockbusters and Arthouse Cinema
Now that Evelyn Wang has gained the ability to effortlessly navigate the multiverse, a sequel could have even more intriguing set-pieces than its predecessor. Everything Everywhere All at Once featured an alternate reality where humans evolved with hot dog fingers; who is to say the sequel couldn’t highlight a multiverse of mustard or a ketchup kingdom?
A Story Focused on Joy Wang
Interestingly enough, the primary antagonist of Everything Everywhere All at Once was Stephanie Hsu’s Joy Wang, Evelyn’s daughter. Joy is a multiversal entity with seemingly limitless powers in her interdimensional iteration. Evelyn’s war with Joy is the multiversal reflection of their real-life strife. Joy is a lesbian, and Evelyn struggles with that fact. Early in the film, Evelyn refuses to reveal Joy’s sexuality to her elderly father, much to Joy’s chagrin.
A potential Everything Everywhere All at once sequel could choose to focus on Joy. Evelyn defeats her multiverse alter-ego at the end of the film, but the Joy in the film’s original reality is still unaware of the multiverse and its infinite possibilities. A theoretical sequel could even be a prequel, exploring the ways in which Joy’s all-powerful multiverse iteration came to be. In any case, Stephanie Hsu’s Joy Wang was one of the best characters in Everything Everywhere All at Once and would be an excellent focal point for a potential sequel.
Everything Everywhere All at Once was arguably one of the best films of 2022. It was incredibly funny but still managed to tug at moviegoers’ heartstrings. If the film’s creators choose to make a sequel, it would undoubtedly be warmly received by audiences, who understand that there are endless possibilities in the multiverse. Hopefully, Everything Everywhere All at Once doesn’t represent the end of Evelyn Wang and her family.
