Every Delayed Movie Sequel Finally Releasing In 2022

A slew of delayed movie sequels finally look set to get their 2022 releases, with some prominent franchises returning to the big screen as a result. For many ongoing film projects, 2020 had a debilitating knock-on effect for their respective productions, with many studios chopping and changing their release slates at will. Marvel’s Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings is a prime example here, with the MCU installment finally getting its release on September 3, 2021, after being moved from February 21, 2021, to May 7, 2021, and then to July 9, 2021.

This kind of developmental hell can be galling for franchise audiences, who often wait with bated breath in-between installments, only to be disappointed by sequel release delays. Alongside the MCU’s several features pushed back in 2021, long-awaited sequels such as A Quiet Place Part II and The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It finally saw a theatrical release after no less than two years of stalled production.

2022, however, looks set to deliver some massive, long-awaited movie sequels to the big screen. In particular, summer 2022 is slated to be a blockbuster bonanza, with Jurassic World: Dominion, the fifth Despicable Me installment, and the MCU’s Thor: Love and Thunder all releasing within 60 days of each other. Here’s every delayed movie sequel finally releasing in 2022.

Jackass 4 – February 4th, 2022

Twenty years after the Jackass movement outgrew its MTV origins and first dominated the big screen, it is confirmed Johnny Knoxville et al. will return for a fourth Jackass installment. Jackass 4 promises to deliver heapings more of the zany over-the-top stunts that initially catapulted its motley crew to fame, with Jackass 4 trailers currently circulating in cinema previews globally. Jackass 4 rumors began circulating as far back as 2012, with Knoxville claiming to have been setting aside ideas for a fourth ‘proper’ Jackass movie ever since the failed franchise offshoot attempt Bad Grandpa in 2013. While Jackass 4 has been confirmed as completed since December 2019, the project spent months on Paramount Pictures’ pending releases slate before finally being green-lit for its now confirmed 2022 release date.

Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets Of Dumbledore – April 15th, 2022

Audiences desperate for a return to the wizarding world have certainly waited long enough to see Magizoologist Newt Scamander (Eddie Redmayne) battle the evil Gellert Grindelwald in the final Fantastic Beasts trilogy installment. Warner Bros. first sounded the delay alarm for the magical project in November 2020, with their confirmation arriving as part of a much larger announcement that Johnny Depp would be stepping away from the sequel project. This placed WB’s Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore on an enforced production hiatus while the team scrambled to recast their nefarious villain Grindelwald, with the role eventually being filled by Mads Mikkelsen. Fantastic Beasts 3, however, has recovered from this rather large speed bump in time for a spring 2022 release date, which promises to wrap up the long-awaited Harry Potter prequel finale in style.

Doctor Strange In The Multiverse Of Madness – May 6th, 2022

It would not be a new year of theatrical releases without several pushed-back MCU installments, and Sam Raimi’s Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness is the first of these here. Anticipation is high for the former Spider-Man trilogy director’s first MCU movie, which will see Doctor Stephen Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch) battle unspeakable evil as he faces a powerful friend-turned-enemy. Like many movie sequels on this list, Doctor Strange’s  multiverse-centric follow-up has seen its release date pushed back several times, with the MCU phase 4 installment first touted for May 7, 2021, and March 25, 2022 release dates prior to Marvel Studios finally settling on May 6th, 2022.

Top Gun: Maverick – May 27th, 2022

Top Gun: Maverick is a passion project 34 years in the making, with Tom Cruise and Val Kilmer finally reprising their iconic roles of Maverick and Iceman, respectively. Paramount has certainly been no rush to get Top: Gun Maverick into theatres for expediency’s sake, with the Top Gun sequel spending a whopping eight years in development that first started back in 2010. Initial filming for Top Gun: Maverick began in 2018, with production moving at a glacial pace before COVID-19 halted its progress completely. While filming has since wrapped for Top: Gun Maverick, its release date was pushed back again following stiff festive box office competition in Spider-Man: No Way Home and Ghostbusters: Afterlife, among others. As a result, Top Gun: Maverick is now set for a far less competitively crowded May 2022 premiere, allowing the historic sequel the time in the limelight it deserves.

John Wick: Chapter 4 – May 27th, 2022

One movie that will still compete directly alongside Top: Gun Maverick, however, is John Wick: Chapter 4, in which the legendary assassin finds himself hunted by the dangerous High Table organization. John Wick redefined the parameters of the action genre in 2014, with Keanu Reeves’ gun-for-hire story balancing high octane action with emotive nuance so compelling it has since birthed three direct sequels. Unlike other delayed sequels on this list, filming was a relatively smooth process for Chad Stahelski’s project, with John Wick: Chapter 4 instead pushed back a full year in order to avoid the game of musical chairs that arose from the pandemic’s evisceration of theatrical scheduling.

Jurassic World: Dominion – June 10th, 2022

Jurassic World: Dominion‘s release will signal the start of a mammoth blockbuster summer in 2020 packed with highly-anticipated sequels and new releases. The sixth film in the Jurassic Park franchise, Dominion, will take place four years after the events of Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, in which genetically engineered dinosaurs are a part of everyday human life. Despite a full year of delays, Jurassic World: Dominion‘s marketing has been full steam ahead before the turn of the year, with its latest lengthy teaser showcasing the divisive Giganotosaurus design.

Minions: The Rise Of Gru – July 1st, 2022

Minions: The Rise of Gru is certainly not afraid of confusing younger-skewing audiences via its timeline, with this fifth Minions franchise installment acting as the sequel to the original Minions prequel in 2015. Set in the 1970s, Minions: The Rise of Gru will follow Despicable Me 3‘s Gru as a young boy who will do anything to become the newest member of his favorite supervillain group, The Vicious 6. Steve Carrell and Pierre Coffin will reprise their roles as Gru, and the Minions cast, respectively, with Minions: The Rise of Gru obtaining a peak summer 2022 movie release date despite the delays caused by the remote-only animation work on the project.

Thor: Love And Thunder – July 8th, 2022

The second MCU property on this list, Thor: Love and Thunder, has been delayed three times before finding a suitable summer 2022 release slot. As the fourth film in the Thor film series and the sixth MCU phase 4 entry, Thor: Love and Thunder will cover lots of new ground for the franchise as the titular god of thunder takes on Gorr the God Butcher (Christian Bale) and lays the groundwork Jane Foster’s (Natalie Portman) famous transformation into Mighty Thor. Filming officially wrapped for Thor: Love and Thunder on June 1st, 2021, with post-production eliminating a big chunk of release options for the studio before settling on a summer 2022 release date.

Mission: Impossible 7 – September 30th, 2022

Tom Cruise is set for massive summer 2022, with Mission: Impossible 7 following Cruise’s hotly-anticipated Top Gun: Maverick. While not as protracted as Maverick‘s 11 years on the production table, Mission: Impossible 7 was certainly hit hard by the enforced COVID-19 production shutdown due to its international and eclectic number of filming locations. Principal photography was, in fact, split into five stages for the latest Mission: Impossible story, with scenes completed in Italy, Norway, England, and Switzerland in a staggered schedule that allowed principal stars Cruise and Hayley Attwell time to move between each location. While little is known about Mission: Impossible 7‘s plot to date, the international, stunt-heavy scenes that took over a year to film promise ample action and adventure from the returning Ethan Hunt and his team.

Halloween Ends – October 14th, 2022

Halloween Ends will mark producer Jason Blum’s final film of the franchise after his prior revisitation to Haddonfield in Halloween (2018) and Halloween Kills. While the 2018 Halloween reboot garnered much praise for its fresh approach to Michael Myers’ lore coupled with the ever-present nostalgic beats of Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee-Curtis), Halloween Kills failed to live up to its predecessor’s standards with a decidedly dry take on Haddonfield’s other residents. Halloween Ends, however, will look to redeem Blum’s Halloween series by finally revealing the seemingly impervious Michael Myers’ weak spot. Like its predecessor Halloween Kills, Halloween Ends was also pushed back one full year due to the COVID-19 pandemic, with Halloween Ends scheduled for a purely theatrical release in October 2022.

Avatar 2 – December 16th, 2022

It seems ludicrous that Avatar 2 has been on 20th Century Studios’ slate for over a decade following the rampant success of James Cameron’s Avatar original film. Confirmed as early as 2010 and initially expected to arrive four years later, Avatar 2 was set to herald the franchise’s expansion by as much as five additional films – highlighting the studio’s confidence in the world of Pandora’s continued appeal. Production belatedly began in mid-2017 for the Avatar 2 story, but the complicated nature of filming mixed with changing CG technology meant further delays were deemed necessary by Cameron and his team. These stumbling blocks coupled with the effect of the pandemic mean Avatar 2 has had a total of eight separate release dates, with the most current set for December 2022, although this again may well be subject to change.