The 86-year-old will release the sequel to his 2000 classic in October and he thinks the plot of the new film has paved the way for another instalment in the franchise to follow at a later date.
Gladiator II has Paul Mescal take centre stage as Lucius as he enters the Colosseum to fight and return glory to Rome.
"With that, I'm already toying with the idea of Gladiator 3. No, seriously! I've lit the fuse," Sir Ridley told France's Premiere magazine.
"The ending of Gladiator II is reminiscent of The Godfather, with Michael Corleone finding himself with a job he didn't want, and wondering, 'Now, Father, what do I do?'
"So the next (Gladiator film) will be about a man who doesn't want to be where he is."
Award-winning filmmaker Ridley Scott is about to release the sequel to 2000's Gladiator. (AP PHOTO)
Sir Ridley recently declared Gladiator II to be one of his best ever films.
"It's the best thing I've ever made ... One of the best things. I've made a few good 'uns," he told Empire magazine.
The British filmmaker revealed the project - which also stars Denzel Washington, Pedro Pascal and Joseph Quinn - boasts the biggest action scene of his entire career, eclipsing 2023 historical drama Napoleon.
"We begin the film with probably the biggest action sequence I've ever done. (It's) probably bigger than anything in Napoleon."
In 2023 Sir Ridley revealed he decided to make Gladiator II because it made sense economically.
"I thought the (first) film was, as it were, completely satisfactory, creatively complete, so why muck with it, right?" the award-winning director told Deadline.
"But these cycles keep going on and on and on, they repeat globally for the last 20 years. It started to spell itself out as an obvious thing to do, and that's how it evolved."
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