Last year, director James Merendino first announced plans to develop a sequel to SLC Punk!, his 1998 film that unflinchingly captured the punk scene as the After-School Special with brief forays into romantic comedy that it is. Just a couple days ago, Merendino confirmed that SLC Punk 2: Punk’s Dead would begin shooting next month, with the return of original cast members Devon Sawa (Sean), Adam Pascal (Eddie), James Duval (John The Mod), and even Michael Goorjian as Heroin Bob, whose character is so punk he not only [spoiler alert] won’t let his death from a drug overdose keep him from appearing in a sequel, he also apparently managed to father a son, Ross, who will be a central part of the new cast. That new cast also includes The Amazing Spider-Man’s Hannah Marks, Twilight’s Sarah Clarke, and rapper Machine Gun Kelly, because this is a movie about punk rock.
However, one person who will decidedly not be involved in honoring the short, fast, and loud philosophy of punk rock by making a 16-years-later sequel is Matthew Lillard. As reported by The Wrap, Lillard tweeted that he’s officially out of SLC Punk 2, adding, “I know, I think it’s weird too.” And indeed, it is weird that the 44-year-old would just abandon his fake-punk lifestyle like that—choosing to do some sellout thing like focus on his more age-appropriate, adult roles, rather than smash the system that says SLC Punk doesn’t need a sequel. (There should be no rules when it comes to planning sequels, Matthew Lillard—only chaos. Man, what happened to you?)
Like Lillard himself once said, poseurs are people who look like punks, but they do it for fashion. And evidently, Lillard was willing to look like a punk back in 1998, for one movie about Hollywood actors looking like punks, but not for a sequel about different Hollywood actors looking like punks. Apparently when all is said and done, he was nothing more than a goddamned, trendy-ass poseur.