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Van Damme's 'Street Fighter' and the never-released sequel with Dolph Lundgren

At the turn of the century, there were plans to develop a sequel to Van Damme’s legendary and reviled ‘Street Fighter’, but this sequel, which would have starred Dolph Lundgren, was never released.

‘Street Fighter’ is one of the most representative movies of Jean-Claude Van Damme’s filmography, and the one that in a way led to his fall into the hells of direct-to-video releases. Nevertheless, it did well at the box office, and there came a time when this adaptation of Capcom’s Street Fighter 2 video game was going to get a sequel starring Dolph Lundgren himself.

Details of Van Damme’s ‘Street Fighter’ sequel starring Dolph Lundgren, which was never released

In 1994, ‘Street Fighter’ was released, a live-action adaptation of Capcom’s 1991 video game Street Fighter II. Although it was a box office hit, it was panned by critics, mainly because of how far it strayed from the source material. However, this did not stop plans for a sequel; in 2003, Dolph Lundgren himself revealed that he would be joining Van Damme in ‘Street Fighter 2′, although he did not comment on specifics beyond his involvement in this new feature film.

Very few details about this canceled project have emerged over the years. It is known that Jean-Claude Van Damme would return from the original film as Colonel William F. Guile and Damian Chapa as Ken Masters. Byron Mann was in negotiations to return as Ryu Hoshi, and Holly Valance would replace Kylie Minogue as Cammy. It is also known that the characters of Blanka and Dhalsim would return, with the latter revealed to have gained the power to superhumanly stretch his limbs from exposure to the chemicals used to mutate Blanka in the first film.

It is also unknown what Dolph Lundgren’s role would have been, so we will never know if it would have been one of the characters from the video games or another created specifically for the movie, as was the case with Sawada, played by the Japanese Kenya Sawada.

jean claude van damme street fighter pelicula

The movie itself left open the possibility of a sequel with a peculiar post-credits scene: after his apparent death and defeat, the fist of General M. Bison emerges from the rubble of his lair, and this time he intends to carry out his plan for world domination.

This indicates that the intention was to use this character again as the villain of a hypothetical second part, although they would have had to hire another actor, as Raúl Juliá died two months before the release of the feature film.

Street Fighter’s big screen journey after the Van Damme movie

When that project fell by the wayside and the movie rights to Street Fighter expired, Universal decided not to renew them. 20th Century Fox picked them up and in 2009 released ‘Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li’ starring Kristin Kreuk, Chris Klein, Neal McDonough, Robin Shou and Michael Clarke Duncan. This movie had a much lower critical and box office reception than Van Damme’s.

Then, in 2014, ‘Street Fighter: Assassin’s Fist’ was released in series and movie format on YouTube, telling the story of Ryu, Ken, his training with Gouken and his rivalry with his brother Akuma. It is considered the most faithful live-action adaptation of Capcom’s fighting game saga.

A new ‘Street Fighter’ reboot is currently in the works, with Alan Ritchson (‘Reacher’) attached to play Guile, produced by Legendary Entertainment and distributed by Sony Pictures. Its expected release date is March 20, 2026, although not many more details have been transcended.