Director Matt Reeves has at last confirmed the origin of the mysterious Cloverfield monster. Fifteen years later. Speaking with SYFY, Reeves revealed that yes, the monster known as Cloverfield is in fact an extraterrestrial, with the final moments of the first movie showing its arrival on Earth.
As well as finally, over a decade later, confirming that Cloverfield is an alien, Reeves also offered some insight into the creature’s mindset. While there has been much speculation ever since the release of Cloverfield back in 2008, Reeves revealed that they did indeed have a concrete origin story in place, and confirmed that, despite being a giant, city-destroying monster, Cloverfield is just a baby.
“When we revisit that footage where they’re on the Ferris wheel at the end, you can see the meteor flying down and hitting the ocean. That’s actually the beginning of the baby being on Earth.”
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So, while Cloverfield may appear to be the story of a giant monster attacking New York City, it is fact about a frightened baby more scared of is than we are of it.
“For sure we did. Because you have to figure how to direct the monster, so to speak. So you have to understand what’s going on with them emotionally. And for me, the big secret was that the monster was a baby and was experiencing separation anxiety. The reason the monster was freaking out is because they were having fits based on looking for their mother.”
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“And so, [the monster] was just as afraid as the main characters, because it seems like there would be nothing more terrifying than the human element fighting this giant monster element and, actually, both of them are just terrified. That’s a mess. That’s not good. So that part of it was absolutely something that we talked about in the development of the creature and in terms of how I shot it.”
Matt Reeves Recently Confirmed Development on Cloverfield 4
Paramount Pictures
Now that Matt Reeves has finally confirmed the origin of the mysterious Cloverfied monster, our thoughts can now turn to the upcoming sequel, Cloverfield 4, which Reeves recently confirmed is in development. “I have no idea. I’m super excited about us doing more, and I can’t give you information about that of course because that’s the way Cloverfield works,” Reeves said regarding the follow-up. “To be honest with you, you never know what you’re going to do. Even though my work is all genre work, I have to feel something personal about it. Cloverfield is very much about my anxieties.”
Cloverfield 4 comes following the first Cloverfield, 10 Cloverfield Lane, and The Cloverfield Paradox, but is expected to be more of a Cloverfield 2, following on directly from the events of Reeves’ first outing. News of another installment in the Cloverfield franchise first broke back in January 2021, with Under the Shadow and I Came By’s Babak Anvari now attached as director.
Whether the fact that Cloverfield is an alien who arrived via meteor, and a baby alien at that, will play into Cloverfield 4 remains to be seen, but no doubt audiences would love to see the return of the mysterious kaiju.
As for Reeves, while he does not reject the idea of returning to the Cloverfield series in future, he is currently pretty busy working on The Batman 2 and his wider Batman shared universe.
