When it was announced earlier this month that the upcoming Cloverfield sequel, previously known as God Particle, had been delayed, it kicked off the usual wave of speculation about the movie possibly being in trouble. Of course, the release date had only been pushed by a few months so a major issue did not seem all that likely. Now this week, however, we are hearing rumours that Paramount is exploring other avenues to release the movie and it could go direct to Netflix instead. Either that’s a bad sign for the movie or it’s simply a sign of the times as another mid-range movie looks to forego a full theatrical release. Hit the jump for more info.

According to Variety, Netflix is currently in talks with Paramount to buy worldwide rights to their upcoming Cloverfield sequel, rumoured to be titled Cloverfield Station. The movie is scheduled to hit theatres on April 20th, but word on the street is that it could hit Netflix even sooner. The news was first reported as a rumour by Jeff Sneider at The Tracking Board but it appears to be gaining traction. As many sources have pointed out, Netflix has been fairly quiet in terms of Sundance acquisitions this year, which may mean that they are focusing on something bigger.

But why would Paramount want to skip a theatrical release for this movie? The two previous Cloverfield films were low budget hits for them (the first made $170 million on a $25 million budget while the second made $110 million from $15 million), but the difference is that this new movie is a bit more expensive ($40 million). There has also been a regime change at Paramount and a new CEO who may not have the same relationship with producer J.J. Abrams. That being said, it still sounds like they don’t have confidence in the final product. Do you think this is good or bad news?