Writer and Director Michael Mann is teaming up with writer Meg Gardiner
Michael Mann fans rejoice - 'Heat' is getting a sequel in book form.
'Heat 2' will be released in book form this year.
Mann has been teasing the project for a few years, and in a tweet today, the legendary director confirmed that the novel will release in August of this year.
The original 'Heat' is seen as the director's masterpiece, and the book is confirmed to "tell an original story about the lives of the characters in the movie both before and after the events depicted in the movie."
Mann told Deadline, who broke the story, that “It’s been my intention for a long time to do the further stories of Heat."
“There was always a rich history or back-story about the events in these people’s lives before 1995 in Heat and projection of where their lives would take them after.”
The book will be released on August 9th, and is being written alongside novelist Meg Gardiner.
The plot description (per Deadline) reads: "The novel Heat 2 starts one day after the events of the film, with a wounded Chris Shiherlis [played by Val Kilmer in Heat] desperate to escape LA."
"The story moves to both the six years preceding the heist and the years immediately following it, featuring new characters and new worlds of high-end professional crime, with highly cinematic action sequences. The venues range from the streets of L.A. to the inner sanctums of rival Taiwanese crime syndicates in a South American free trade zone, to a massive drug cartel money-laundering operation just over the border in Mexico, and eventually to Southeast Asia."
'Heat 2' represents Mann's first project since 2015's thriller 'Blackhat' which starred Chris Hemsworth as a computer hacker, and Mann is confirmed to be returning to the world of 'Miami Vice' he helped pioneered in the 1980s.
Mann will direct the pilot for 'Tokyo Vice' which is due to debut on Apple TV+ sometime in 2022.
“When I was writing the film, it was imperative for me to create complete life stories about all the characters and to know everything about them,” Mann said.
The book is scheduled for release on August 9th.