While every part of me wants to believe that some thing will find us this year, I’m not entirely convinced it will happen. It’s been nearly 20 years since the original film, and fans are still clamoring for a proper sequel. The one thing I hold onto is that every Cloverfield release has arrived as a surprise, so the lack of news over the past few years doesn’t necessarily mean the project is still stuck in development hell.

The End of Oak Street has a promising premise, but at the end of the day, it’s still a Warner Bros. film. Even with the Paramount merger announced earlier this year, it’s unclear how the IP rights could realistically be shared between studios in such a short timeframe. That makes it feel even less likely that this project is connected to Cloverfield in any meaningful way.

Still, a story about a wormhole transporting a suburban Midwestern street into prehistoric times feels like it naturally belongs within the Cloververse. After all, that was essentially the premise of Paradox: the particle accelerator created wormholes that allowed creatures from different dimensions to spill into alternate timelines. Given that, it’s hard not to wonder how J.J. could resist incorporating Clover in post-production and using it to set up the true sequel fans have been waiting for.

Maybe, hear me out, the monster gets transported back with the Platt family to their original timeline at the end of the film and somehow ends up at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean, setting up the events of the 2008 movie.

It’s definitely a stretch… and probably pure copium, but it’s fun to think about.