After three failed reboots in the space of a decade, the big screen future of the Terminator franchise is looking pretty bleak. Neither Salvation, Genisys or Dark Fate pulled in anywhere close to the box office numbers or critical reactions that were expected, which isn’t a good look when the combined production costs amounted to $540 million.
You know things aren’t seeming positive when even the stars are forced to admit that their contributions to the mythology bombed because people simply weren’t interested any more, and those were the words of Dark Fate‘s Mackenzie Davis, whose film drew the best critical notices that the franchise had seen since Judgment Day and reunited Arnold Schwarzenegger, Linda Hamilton and James Cameron.
Theatrically, the goose might be well and truly cooked, but insider Daniel Richtman now claims that Cameron is of the opinion that the property can still be as big as Avatar in terms of commercial success. Of course, the director has always had lofty ambitions and holds himself to very high standards, which he’s spent the majority of his career matching if not exceeding, but if he did indeed say that, then he’s caught somewhere between misguided optimism and utter nonsense.
For one, the entire six-film series hasn’t even come close to matching Avatar‘s singular haul, which is one that’s only increased to see the sci-fi epic reclaim the title of highest-grossing movie ever from Avengers: Endgame. Then again, Cameron can say whatever he wants no matter how patently ludicrous it reads on paper given that he currently has no involvement in Terminator at all, having sold the rights off four decades ago and watched them bounce around Hollywood ever since, while he was strictly a contracted creative talent on Dark Fate and nothing more.
