Sony Pictures has put 24 Jump Street into development, attaching Rodney Rothman to direct and co-write the screenplay as Jonah Hill, Channing Tatum and Ice Cube are in talks to reprise their roles in the R-rated comedy series.
Rothman is credited as a writer on the project alongside Hill and Meghan Malloy; Neal H. Moritz, Phil Lord and Chris Miller are returning as producers. Tatum and Reid Carolin will produce through Free Association while Hill and Matt Dines are producing under their Strong Baby banner. Neal H. Moritz also posted the screenplay’s title page on Instagram this week, signaling the studio has moved beyond long-running development discussions.
The news matters because the Jump Street brand has been dormant as a film franchise for more than a decade despite strong box-office returns for the first two installments: 21 Jump Street, released in 2012, grossed more than $200 million worldwide, and 22 Jump Street, released in 2014, earned $331 million. The project is the clearest sign yet that Sony intends to continue that run rather than let the property sit.
The choice of title plays with a built-in joke: the films have repeatedly made a gag of sequential numbering. The end of 22 Jump Street sent Schmidt and Jenko through multiple fake sequel scenarios — including a string of alternate careers and formats — with lines that underlined the joke: Jenko says, "Next year, we’ll probably just be right back across the street, just next door," and Schmidt replies, "Let’s not get ahead of ourselves." Producer Neal H. Moritz summed up the long wait in plain terms: "It took so long to make we had to skip one."
That skipped number is the obvious friction. For years Sony quietly developed a third film — at one point a proposed crossover with another studio franchise — and Channing Tatum once described the scrapped 23 Jump Street script as "the best script that I’ve ever read for a third movie." The new plan jumps to 24 Jump Street instead, and while the title continues the franchise gag, it also raises the practical question of why the studio moved past the earlier effort.
The current status leaves one concrete and unavoidable gap: at present Tatum has only been extended an offer to return, and the other actors are still in negotiations. Negotiations are expected to take place soon, which makes the next few weeks decisive for whether the three leads will actually close deals to reassemble the original comedy team.
Beyond casting, the creative team is now defined: Rodney Rothman will direct and is a credited co-writer with Hill and Malloy, and Lord, Miller and Moritz will produce. That grouping keeps the series’ original producing architecture largely intact even as the script process shifts to a new trio of writers. The production banners attached on talent deals—Free Association and Strong Baby—signal that the actors are being invited back not only as stars but as creative partners.
No release date has been announced. What happens next is straightforward: Sony moves the package through negotiations and attempts to lock the returning cast; if Hill, Tatum and Ice Cube sign, the film will likely enter preproduction under Rothman with the producers already attached. If one or more do not, the studio faces a choice between recasting, reshaping the script or shelving the effort again. The immediate, measurable hurdle is therefore contracting: the franchise can only resume on-screen once those deals are closed.
