The original 'Terminator' director confirms talks to resurrect the classic sci-fi franchise and admits bringing back Arnold Schwarzenegger and Linda Hamilton for 2019 reboot was a mistake.
- December 21, 2022
AceShowbiz - James Cameron confirms "discussion" to reboot "Terminator". The 68-year-old filmmaker has broken silence about the future of his longrunning franchise, which started with the original sci-fi classic in 1984 but stuttered with 2019's "Terminator: Dark Fate".
"If I were to do another 'Terminator' film and maybe try to launch that franchise again, which is in discussion, but nothing has been decided, I would make it much more about the AI side of it than bad robots gone crazy," he told the "Smartless" podcast about his ideas for a seventh movie.
"Dark Fate" was helmed by "Deadpool" director Tim Miller from a story by Cameron himself, and was seen as a revival of the franchise with original stars Arnold Schwarzenegger and Linda Hamilton reuniting as the T-800 Terminator and Sarah Connor respectively.
While Cameron was "reasonably happy" with the movie, there was a clash between himself and the director when it came to bringing back the original cast members. Whereas Cameron refused to make the film without Arnie, Miller was only keen to have Hamilton return.
The "Avatar" filmmaker explained, "I think the movie could have survived having Linda in it. I think it could have survived having Arnold in it, but when you put Linda and Arnold in it and then, you know, she's 60-something, he's 70-something, all of a sudden it wasn't your 'Terminator' movie, it wasn't even your dad's 'Terminator' movie, it was your granddad's 'Terminator' movie. And we didn't see that... We loved it, we thought it was cool."
Cameron directed and co-wrote the original "Terminator" film and its 1991 sequel "Terminator 2: Judgment Day", but had no involvement at all with follow-ups "Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines" (2003), "Terminator Salvation" (2009), and "Terminator Genisys" (2015), which got slammed by critics.
