Cloverfield 3 Plot Involves a ‘Near Future Scenario’

Sci-fi movie Cloverfield 3 has a plot that involves a “near future scenario” says actor Daniel Bruhl. Most everything about the upcoming third Cloverfield movie remains a tightly guarded secret. However, some details have begun leaking out, including a possible title. Known up to now as God Particle, Cloverfield 3 may actually be called Cloverfield Station.

The loosely-connected sci-fi horror series began in 2008 with Cloverfield, a J.J. Abrams-produced monster movie about a towering alien terrorizing New York. The film took advantage of an innovative viral marketing campaign to make $80 million at the domestic box office. A sequel of sorts arrived in 2016 with 10 Cloverfield Lane, a Twilight Zone-like thriller only vaguely connected to the original film. Cloverfield 3 continues the tradition of secretiveness and sly viral marketing in hopes of intriguing audiences. With a few months left until the movie’s release, no trailer has yet arrived.

Speaking to Collider, Cloverfield 3 actor Daniel Bruhl did give up a small hint about the mysterious sci-fi film. Bruhl talked about research he did preparing for the film, set on a space station in earth orbit:

I went to UCLA and I met some very brilliant students and scientists there. It was only 2% of the information that I was given by them that I remotely understood. It’s based on many interesting ideas about a near future scenario, which is an interesting vision of what could happen or what might happen with the Earth. I’m bit scared to talk about it because it’s so extremely secretive. I’m afraid of ending up in a Bad Robot prison.

Bruhl also confirmed that he was familiar with the first two Cloverfield movies before he was approached to appear in the third, and expanded upon what else drew him to the project:

I was aware of the movies and wanted to enter that universe that they created. J.J. Abrams is such a mastermind in that genre. It was very attractive to work with all of these wonderful actors. I’ve always wanted to do a space movie, so I couldn’t wait to end up floating in space and solving huge problems.

Though J.J. Abrams has employed his usual Cloverfield approach of keeping the plot under wraps, some alleged details did leak out last year. Reportedly, Cloverfield 3 sees its station crew stranded in orbit when the earth suddenly disappears as an apparent result of their particle accelerator experiments. Indeed, Bruhl in his statement above seems to confirm that something pretty catastrophic does happen to earth. Or at least the astronauts believe something has happened to earth. The station crew then finds a space shuttle coming toward them, but don’t know if they should trust it. The story takes place against the backdrop of a world war somehow spurred on by invading aliens (possibly the aliens we briefly met in 10 Cloverfield Lane).

Like 10 Cloverfield Lane before it, Cloverfield 3 began life as a standalone story unconnected to the Cloverfield universe. The film’s writer Oren Uziel previously described how his God Particle script was extensively reworked to become the film possibly called Cloverfield Station. The hope is that the Cloverfield branding will prompt audiences to check out a movie they wouldn’t otherwise care about. This points up the difficulty of marketing original stories in the current franchise-dominated climate. Had 10 Cloverfield Lane not carried a connection to Cloverfield, it likely would have fallen through the cracks. As it happens, the film grossed $72 million domestically. And it did so with little marketing. Can the secretive, viral approach work again? We’ll find out.