Well, all you ladies and gents who were hoping to feast your eyes on some more hot strippin' men whenever Magic Mike 3 came around are about to be completely disappointed. Mister Magic Mike himself, Channing Tatum, has decreed that no third film will follow, and he's got a good reason.
The third installment will be the show, and I think it has to evolve past these guys. The first one was about Mike, the second one was about the guys and I think the third one is really about man and woman having a conversation about sex and themselves and who we all are. That's the next step I would like to take with the story.
Channing Tatum spoke to an audience at the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity this week, which was attended by The Hollywood Reporter, and revealed that his future plans for the half-naked-man-filled franchise do not focus on movies at all. He spoke about bringing Magic Mike to the stage, and that certainly explains why more movies are out, at least at this point. There's not a whole lot of room in this story for more Mike and friends in a new film, and having the story "evolve past" the original Magic Mike team. Also, it does make sense that Tatum wouldn't want to spend his life talking about his stripper past, so I can see him wanting to take the basics of the story and have it morph into something deeper.
Does that sound too highfalutin for a story about male strippers to you? I get it; while the first film in the franchise did manage to mix some general hunky good times with a story about a guy who'd rather not be stripping anymore, but is, nonetheless, very skilled at it, the sequel was goofy as all hell. Magic Mike XXL reveled in all the absurd aspects of the male stripper world, but at least made the experience fun by having all the actors be in on the joke. But, to go from that back to a more serious story is a turn around that I think most fans of the second film could not have expected.
Not that most Magic Mike fans would even be able to see what Channing Tatum has in store next. He's currently working on ideas for an actual Broadway musical, which is, presumably, the show that will deal with "who we all are." Tatum is also helping to assemble a Las Vegas dance show, which had better basically be a male stripping revue or there is no point to it at all.
Hopefully, Channing Tatum and the rest of the creative team behind the Broadway show will be able to instill the right amount of fun into the heavier relationship aspects of the musical. Because, really, I don't think most people can talk about male strippers and not have smiles on their faces for at least 70% of the time.
