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I loved the 2015 crime drama Sicario. Directed by Denis Villeneuve and beautifully photographed by Roger Deakins, the unsettling thriller was loaded with fantastic performances and an amazing score by Jóhann Jóhannsson. In addition, Taylor Sheridan’s fantastic script kept audiences on the edge of their seat while also tackling serious real world issues about America’s war on the Mexican drug cartels. If you’ve never seen the film, I strongly recommend checking it out.

When I first heard they were making a sequel to Sicario, Sicario: Day of the Soldado, I’ll admit I was skeptical. But when they announced screenwriter Taylor Sheridan was returning to pen the script and both Benicio Del Toro and Josh Brolin were also involved, my fears subsided. After all, both Brolin and Del Toro are the types of actors that get offered a number of high-profile projects and wouldn’t come back unless the sequel was being done with the same care as the first film.

I also felt better about the sequel when Brolin told me how Soldado compares to Sicario:

“I think it’s just more severe, man. All the way around. I think the characters are more severe. I think the movie is more severe. I think it’s just much bigger. It’s just a bigger scope film. Like I said, when I saw it it was like Sicario felt like a small movie to me, even though it was a very intimate movie. I’ve always said I don’t understand why bigger movies can’t be just as intimate, if not more intimate. Why do they have to be less emotional? I think Soldado‘s a perfect example of that. I think it’s extremely emotional. I think it’s extremely tense and it deals with similar subject matters.”

Last week at CinemaCon in Las Vegas, I got to talk with Benicio Del Toro backstage at the closing night Awards ceremony. He was in town to help promote the Sicario sequel, directed by Stefano Sollima, as well as receive the “CinemaCon Male Star of the Year Award” from The National Association of Theatre Owners (NATO).

During the interview Del Toro talked about how Sicario: Day of the Soldado has plenty of surprises and “Oh shit” moments, if he was nervous to make a sequel to such a well-regarded film, how they’re thinking about making a third one, if he knew when they were making Sicario that it would be such a special film, and how he still can’t believe he’s part of a ride at Disneyland (Guardians of the Galaxy).