Why Disney is right to make a Free Guy sequel is a valid query from some quarters, given that it was initially slated to be an original IP movie. The announcement that Disney officially wants a sequel came just one day after Free Guy was released across the U.S., with director Shawn Levy and lead man Ryan Reynolds confirming the media conglomerate's intent via Twitter. Free Guy's opening box office weekend was better than expected, with critics and moviegoers alike wooed in equal part by the ingenuity of the script and the ever-charming Reynolds.
Free Guy follows Guy (Reynolds), a bank teller who discovers he is an NPC in an open-world video game called Free City after meeting a player avatar named Molotov Girl (Jodie Comer). While Guy grapples with his newfound reality, Molotov girl's human counterpart Millie and fellow programmer Keys (Joe Keery) plot to expose Antwan's (Taika Waititi) theft of their game code, which Free City is built upon. Channing Tatum, Lil Rel Howery, and Utkarsh Ambudkar also add laughs as Guy embarks on a journey of self-discovery, taking up the mantle of hero to save Free City from certain destruction.
Disney is absolutely right to make a Free Guy sequel, even considering the seemingly idyllic ending. While Keys and Millie kindle their love by the climax of the movie and Guy is reunited with Buddy, there is still ample room to explore their next adventures further. A Free Guy sequel would also have essentially unlimited potential in its next narrative, given the programmable existence that Guy and the other NPCs still live in. In addition, Free Guy serves as a reminder that Hollywood can produce original franchises at a time when the box office is traditionally dominated by long-held intellectual properties such as the MCU.
A strong reason to revisit the Free Guy universe (aside from the sheer number of Free Guy's celebrity cameos) is the character relationships cultivated throughout the story. In particular, the main conclusion of Free Guy's romantic narratives between Millie and Keys is the movie's penultimate scene, in which both characters finally realize their love for one another. While the payoff from this long-anticipated scene is touching, it is clear that there is a lot more for the writers of the Free Guy sequel to explore between these two characters given Millie's romantic relationship with Guy and the continued development of their own game, 'Free Life.'
Yet, the most compelling argument for a Free Guy sequel lies in the project's almost unlimited scope moving forward. Whereas Free Guy mostly takes place in Free City, the sequel does not necessarily have to be bound by constraint to a single videogame or digital world, an argument further helped by a lack of end credit scene in Free Guy. A plot device such as a code re-write or a new software development would allow for almost unbridled creativity in what the sequel could deliver, with no premise too thin given the ease in which the original already incorporates numerous easter eggs and plot twists. Free Guy delivers an interesting, wholly original world, and as a result, it deserves additional exploration at a time when many franchise universes are predetermined. While the high box office numbers from Free Guy's opening weekend provide further validation towards the sequel announcement, the vast potential of the next chapter is argument enough for a second installment. Guy ends the movie by telling Buddy, "we can do whatever we want," and that is exactly the stance Disney and the Free Guy team should be taking for the sequel.