Between the success of Paranormal Activity and the buzz about a potential sequel, it’s no wonder that The Blair Witch Project writer/director Eduardo Sánchez is itching to get in on the action. Sánchez and co-creator Daniel Myrick turned down an offer to direct the sequel, Book of Shadows: Blair Witch, but that doesn’t mean they didn’t have continuation plans of their own.

In an interview with The Toronto Star (via Coming Soon), Sánchez said that he and Myrick are working on Blair Witch 3. Well, it’s more like Blair Witch 2. Their new film will pick up right where the first left off and continue as though Book of Shadows never happened. The guys drove out to the site of the first film in search of inspiration and put together a film treatment. “We're at the step where we're about to pitch to Lionsgate, which owns the movie rights now. It's pretty much up to them. They can completely squash it or greenlight it.” If the project is given the go-ahead, it’ll involve original cast members Heather Donahue, Joshua Leonard and Michael C. Williams, but in smaller roles, and utilize a “mixed first-person” technique rather than being entirely reliant on the narrate-into-a-shaky-cam style.

Sánchez is pleased to see the monumental success of Oren Peli’s similarly fashioned Paranormal Activity but is envious as well. “I'm happy for the guy ... but at the same time, there's the feeling that, man, I could have done this. It would have been different and might not have been as good. But I know how to make these films. To me it's like, man, maybe I should go back and kind of milk this one more time.” With Sánchez stressing his “mixed first-person” concept, it’s unlikely he’ll be milking that format much more. We’ll get a taste of what this technique is all about with Sánchez’s next project Possessed, a low-budget horror flick that will “show things that have not been seen before.”

The only which makes another Blair Witch film remotely acceptable is Sánchez and Myrick’s detachment from Book of Shadows. If Blair Witch 3 actually happens, I’d guess it’d be of much better quality and could even bring something new to the table. Step one of assessing the potential of a third film will be seeing what Sánchez can do with this whole “mixed first-person” in Possessed.