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Paramount Pictures
The “Terminator” franchise has been surprisingly enduring, with at least some presence in the pop culture landscape dating back to James Cameron’s original 1984 sci-fi classic, a surprise box office success. That success led to one of the best sequels of all time, “Terminator 2: Judgment Day,” and a bunch of other sequels of varying quality. Most recently, 2019’s “Terminator: Dark Fate” tried to right the ship, with mixed results. The film’s director, Tim Miller, seems to know where things went wrong.
In a recent interview with Variety, Miller reflected a bit on “Dark Fate,” which was billed as more of a direct sequel to “T2,” bringing back Arnold Schwarzenegger as the Terminator and Linda Hamilton as Sarah Connor. Cameron was even back on board as a story contributor and producer. Miller, best known as the director of the first “Deadpool,” explained that he is “a nerd” who was “trying to do what [he] would want to see as a nerd.” However, that didn’t pay off in the end, and Miller acknowledges the movie “movie didn’t exactly set the world on fire.”
Despite being billed as “the best Terminator movie in decades” by /Film at the time, the film fizzled at the box office, taking in $261 million worldwide against a massive $185 million budget. So what went wrong? Miller further explained:
“Nobody sets out to disregard someone’s closely held childhood dreams. It’s no cause for vitriol. A lot of people didn’t like ‘Terminator: Dark Fate’ for reasons I had nothing to do with. One, because it was the sixth film and another because we killed John Connor at the start, but if Jim Cameron wants that to happen – which I agree with by the way – then that’s what you do.”
Terminator: Dark Fate was too little, too late
Paramount Pictures
To Miller’s point, the decision to kill John Connor in “Dark Fate” was always going to be met with some pushback by hardcore fans. Like that Mandarin twist in “Iron Man 3” or any number of bold choices in big franchise films, that just comes with the territory. So that’s certainly an element at play, but is it the biggest element?
For my money, Miller’s other point that this is the sixth film in a franchise where its best days were decades in the rearview mirror is the bigger culprit here. “Terminator 3” was harmless enough, but “Terminator: Salvation” and “Terminator: Genisys” were met with a much less favorable response from critics and audiences alike. So it is true that people may have generally liked Miller’s film more, but at that point many audiences had already decided to check out. Cameron, sharing his thoughts on why the “Dark Fate” flopped, suggested that “there was nothing in the movie for a new audience.”
As for the future? Netflix recently released the anime series “Terminator Zero,” which was well received. Cameron has also teased that he might be working on a new entry in the franchise, but he’s also neck-deep in his “Avatar” sequels, so putting a lot of stock in that seems like wishful thinking, at least for now.
“Terminator: Dark Fate” is available on VOD, or you can grab a copy on Blu-ray/DVD via Amazon.