As soon as it became clear Goon had scored a clean hit at the box office, the team behind the Michael Dowse-directed feature started talking about giving it a second shot.

“The producers owned the remake rights [and] eOne had an option to acquire. We started discussing the sequel as soon as the first one became a hit. It took a while for the ensemble of actors to become available and for the script to be developed – by which I mean funny enough,” Mark Slone, EVP of theatrical distribution at Entertainment One, told Playback Daily.

News that a sequel has been greenlit broke in May and on Wednesday, eOne announced many of the key cast from Goon were reprising their roles for the sequel, including Seann William Scott, Jay Baruchel, Liev Schreiber, Marc-André Grondin, Kim Coates and Alison Pill. Baruchel co-wrote the script and will direct. Also joining the cast of the sequel is real-life hockey wife, Canadian Elisha Cuthbert.

With an original that earned over $4.1 million in the box office in 2012, which Sloan compared to the Canadian gross earnings of Hollywood films such as Lincoln and Diary of a Wimpy Kid, the hope is that sequel will live up to its predecessor’s standard, or even surpass it.

“I think Goon was the hockey movie Canadians were waiting for since Slapshot. In addition to the great play in theatres, the DVD and digital releases were also very successful. All the partners – TMN, Movie Central, iTunes – said, ‘make part two.’ We hope that come release, the awareness of the sequel will best the original,” Slone said.

Goon: The Last of the Enforcers is produced by No Camping Films’ David Gross, Jesse Shapira and Jeff Arkuss and Andre Rouleau of Caramel Films. eOne will handle the Canadian distribution of the film. The script for Goon: The Last of the Enforcers was co-written by Jesse Chabot and Baruchel. Producer credits on the original Goon belonged to Don Carmody, Gross and Shapira.