Kevin Smith has revealed that he scrapped a ‘Karen’ joke from the final cut of Clerks III.
More than 15 years after the sequel to the original 1994 cult classic was released, we’re finally getting another glimpse into the action behind the counter of Quick Stop.
The third outing, which is released in cinemas on September 16, sees Randal (Jeff Anderson) rally his pals Dante (Brian O’Halloran), and Jay and Silent Bob (Jason Mewes and Kevin Smith respectively) to make a movie based on his experiences at everyone’s favorite convenience store.
However, chatting to Metro.co.uk, Kevin – who wrote, directed and starred in the trilogy – shed light on a particular scene that didn’t make it into the finished product.
‘There was, not an opening scene, but a post credit scene, where the boys dealt with a Karen, if you will,’ he let slip when questioned on moments that went ‘too far’.
‘We shot it, and it was good, but it just felt redundant. It felt very thirsty. It felt like the guy who made Clerks going, “Hey, man, remember them with the customers?”
‘Let’s be honest, this iteration of Clerks isn’t so much about like, “It’s fun to deal with retail people”. If anything, it’s a celebration of the customers that came through.
‘Clerks, the first movie, is a denigration of those customers. It’s people b***hing about having to work and all the people that come into the store. Whereas, by the time you get to Clerks III, it’s a complete paradigm shift in as much as you don’t have d**k without the customers.
‘So it felt inauthentic on some level to have Randall, right out the gate, be f**king with customers. It just felt like somebody saw Clerks and wrote a Clerks III sequel.’
Brian also suggested that the joke in question would have been ‘too old’ by the time the film ended up on the big screen.
‘There was a there was a scene with one of the actresses from Saturday Night Live that was taking what was going on in the world at the time, with mask wearing and Covid and stuff that I believe – in retrospect, when editing the film – would have been just a little too old,’ he recalled.
‘We took the whole, “You should be wearing a mask” and cancel culture, to a level that probably was funny, maybe eight months ago, but now with the release of the film would be like, “Okay, we made these types of jokes back then”, kind of thing?
‘We did push something pretty far that is not in the film, maybe the deleted scenes?’
Kevin did share that fans will get to see the footage eventually, adding: ‘It’s the only part of the movie that I felt like, “Oh, this feels like I’m trying”. The rest of it felt natural and authentic.
‘We shot it, I was glad I got it, it’ll be on the extras. But we lifted it out of the movie.’
Clerks III is in cinemas on September 16.
