The Nice Guys 2 Isn’t Happening, And Ryan Gosling Blames A Forgotten Animated Movie

Clay Katis’ and Fergal Reilly’s “The Angry Birds Movie” was based, rather infamously, on a mobile phone game, first released by the Finnish company Rovio Entertainment in 2009. The premise of the game was simple: a player loaded a limbless bird into a massive slingshot and flung it at rickety stone castles populated by smug, green pigs. The more a player could knock over, the higher their score. It was an ideally mindless game, perfect for wasting time in airports. “Angry Birds” became unexpectedly huge, however, and it was only a matter of time before Hollywood came knocking. The resulting movie starred Jason Sudeikis as the angriest of the birds. It’s not a good film. 

When Gosling was asked about making “The Nice Guys 2,” he placed its struggle to get made directly on the shoulders of “The Angry Birds Movie,” saying:

“So much of a sequel, I think, is decided by the opening weekend of a movie, and we opened up against ‘Angry Birds.’ So ‘Angry Birds’ just, just destroyed us. ‘Angry Birds’ got a sequel.”

Both films opened on March 20, 2016. “The Nice Guys” opened to $11 million. “The Angry Birds Movie” opened just north of $38 million. The writing was on the wall. And the wall was knocked over by a slingshotted bird carcass. “Angry Birds” would ultimately make over $350 million worldwide, making it a legitimate hit and surprising everyone. In 2019, “The Angry Birds Movie 2” was released, making another $152 million. 

Shane Black still loved “The Nice Guys,” and even wanted to develop the film into a TV series … which was the filmmaker’s original plan anyway. That fell through, too. 

In more ways than one, “Nice Guys” fans really, really wanted to flip the bird.