Twisters is coming. The film, an indirect sequel to the 1996 tornado-chaser hit Twister, will have the same stormy thrills as the original, but that’s about where the similarities end.
Glen Powell described Twisters to Vogue as “its own standalone story in the modern day.”
“I don’t think anyone has brought up this movie in forever, but talking to people, they’re like, ‘That was one of my favorite movies growing up. That movie terrified me,’ ” he added.
Powell shared that his Top Gun: Maverick costar Tom Cruise told him that large-scale movies need to be able to connect with “everyone around the world in every territory,” which Powell said is a key element to Twisters‘ appeal.
“Humans-versus-weather is a very universal idea,” Powell explained. “How powerless we really are in the face of these cataclysmic forces.”
What the films will have in common, aside from the titular tornadoes, is the palpable excitement of the characters and story.
“What was essential to me was that it always felt like in that first movie, which didn’t necessarily feel like a disaster movie,” director Lee Isaac Chung told Entertainment Weekly.
“To me, it felt like an adventure movie, and I always loved how that movie inspired a generation of meteorologists and people who were interested in science and weather just because it made that study feel like it was an adventure,” he explained. “That’s something that I wanted to retain with this one.”
Here’s everything to know about the Twisters movie.
What is Twisters about?
Universal
With a screenplay by Mark. L Smith (The Revenant) and Lee Isaac Chung — the Oscar-nominated writer-director of Minari — at the helm, Twisters, like its predecessor, is about tornadoes. But don’t expect any of the original characters to appear in the sequel.
“We’re not trying to recreate the story from the first one,” Powell told Vogue in December 2023. “It’s a completely original story. There are no characters from the original movie back, so it’s not really a continuation.”
In Twisters, Powell stars as social media personality and self-proclaimed “Tornado Wrangler” Tyler Owens, who chases storms for thrills (and likes). Javi (Anthony Ramos) coaxes pal Kate Cooper (Daisy Edgar-Jones) — a fearful storm tracker who prefers studying meteorology from the safety of behind her computer screen in New York City — to test out new technology on tornadoes in Oklahoma.
Kate and Tyler’s opposing approaches to storm chasing, as well as the twisters themselves, bring on a ton of drama and adventure.
In the original Twister, a team of scientists and storm chasers, led by Jo (Helen Hunt) and Bill (Bill Paxton), follows a series of tornadoes to test out a new piece of technology and gather data on the storms.
Who are the stars of Twisters?
Universal
Powell, fresh off the success of rom-com Anyone But You with Sydney Sweeney, stars in Twisters alongside Normal People actress Daisy Edgar-Jones — and he couldn’t be more thrilled about it.
“I mean, we have the best of the best in terms of actors and department heads on this thing,” Powell told PEOPLE at the SAG Awards in February. “Lee Isaac Chung directed the hell out of it.”
Noting that he’d just seen the finished film, he said, “It’s spectacular. I’m super excited to unleash it on audiences this summer.”
Ramos, Brandon Perea, Daryl McCormack, Maura Tierney, Kiernan Shipka, Sasha Lane, Superman star David Corenswet, Katy O’Brian, Nik Dodani, TV on the Radio frontman Tunde Adebimpe and Harry Hadden-Paton round out the cast, which director Chung says he deliberately kept diverse.
“When you’re out there hanging out with real chasers, you realize that they come from all different places, all different backgrounds, so I wanted to fill this film with people who come from all different walks of life,” Chung told Entertainment Weekly.
He continued, “I knew that I wanted audiences to chase tornadoes with this movie, so who are the people who they’d want to chase a storm with? That was kind of the measure that I was using a lot in the way that we cast, but also in the way that these characters were shaped and written.”
Is Helen Hunt in Twisters?
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Hunt isn’t credited in the Twisters cast. She previously tried to get a sequel to the 1996 smash, but Daveed Diggs said her pitch was rejected.
Hunt herself said that her sequel pitch didn’t get far with Universal Pictures.
She said on Watch What Happens Live! with Andy Cohen that she wanted the sequel to feature “all Black and Brown storm chasers.”
“We could barely get a meeting, and this is in June of 2020 when it was all about diversity,” she said. “And it would’ve been so cool. There was a HBCU [historically Black college and university] where we wanted it to take place, and a rocket-science club, and in this one, they shoot the rockets into the tornado — it was gonna be so cool.”
Is there a trailer for Twisters?
The first trailer for Twisters dropped during the 2024 Super Bowl. In it, we see Ramos’ character Javi speaking to Tyler Owens (Powell) and Kate Cooper (Edgar-Jones) over a radio, telling them to get out of the way of a storm that’s approaching them.
Wind launches something into their SUV’s windshield, and as they get out to assess the damage, materials from the roof of the vehicle blow away as a tornado gets closer, eventually sucking the entire car away.
“When the first Twister was released, I remember just being blown away by the trailer,” director Chung told Entertainment Weekly. “I remember feeling how realistic that tornado looked. I’d never seen anything like that. I still remember that trailer, and I know that with this one, we need to try to top it.”
Where was Twisters filmed?
Universal
Appropriately enough, Twisters was filmed in the heart of real-life Tornado Alley. Most of the movie was shot at Prairie Surf Studios in Oklahoma City, The Oklahoman reported, with some scenes also filmed in Cashion, Chickasha, El Reno, Okarche and Spencer, Oklahoma.
When will Twisters be released?
Universal
Twisters hits theaters on July 19, 2024.
