Kevin Smith, who once claimed he was retiring from directing, has quite the feature film slate line-up over the course of the next two years. But he is now changing those plans somewhat, pushing the sequel Mallrats 2 to the forefront. The comedy was originally announced for an early 2016 start date. That changed to late 2015. But now it seems the movie will come first on the docket to take advantage of a key shooting location that may not be around very much longer, with production set to start sometime soon.

The original plan saw Kevin Smith, who just finished shooting the second film in his True North Trilogy Yoga Hosers, doing Clerks III next, followed by his hockey epic Hit Somebody, and the True North trilogy ending Moose Jaws after that. Mallrats 2 was originally the last of these four movies set to move into production. But Kevin Smith has pulled his Mallrats 2 cast together quicker than hoped for, with original stars Jason Mewes, Jason Lee, Stan Lee, Michael Rooker, Shannen Doherty, Jeremy London, Renée Humphrey, Joey Lauren Adams, Sven-Ole Thorsen and Ethan Suplee confirmed to return. He has now found the perfect mall to shoot it in too, and its a location that will allow for the climatic third act to come together as intended. He explains, but be warned, there is a spoiler in the mix:

We've been putting together Mallrats 2....It's been a real, like Blues Brothers 'We're putting the band back together, on a mission from Smod.' So this week, we had a lot of activity behind the scenes as well and it looks like we might - it's Mallrats and so we require a big old empty mall, and it would be nice if we could do things to the mall. So if you had a mall and the mall was eventually going away, that would let you like blow the f-ing mall up, which happens in the third act.

So we found a place that we can go to and in order to get to that mall before it goes away, we were talking about initially shooting Clerks 3 this summer and then we were going to get to Mallrats in the beginning of 2016. And then it jumped into 2015, where we were going to shoot Clerks and then hopefully Mallrats before the end of the year. But now, based on a f-ing mall that we all dig that will be going away, the priority has become Mallrats. So the next f-ing movie I'm making is Mallrats 2. No word on Batfleck yet...but it would be fun to see if we could get him."

Mallrats 2 has been in the press quite a bit lately, as Kevin Smith went about securing his cast. Its fresh on everyone's mind, and it simply makes more sense for the movie to move forward first. Clerks III has dropped out of the conversation somewhat, and it already missed its 20th anniversary date. And it sounds like the script for Mallrats 2 is ready to go.

What do you think? Out of the four projects the director has lined up, do you want to see Mallrats 2 the most? Or do you think he's going to really knock it out of the park with Moose Jaws? And do you think he'll actually be able to secure a couple of shooting days with Ben Affleck? The first movie, did, however auspiciously, help kick start the actor's career. Without the original Mallrats, we might not have Batfleck!