With Avatar: Fire and Ash hitting cinemas this week, director James Cameron has been talking about his career and future films outside of the Pandora-set franchise, and one of his other successful series’, The Terminator, is on his docket for a new reboot/revamp in the near future, and has been talking about its future – including who might, or might not, appear.
In an in-depth interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Cameron talked about his future outside of Avatar and a new Terminator film, one removed from the “original” timelines, is on his docket, but that it will be the first one in the series not to feature any sort of appearance from Arnold Schwarzenegger.
“I can safely say he won’t be [in it]. It’s time for a new generation of characters. I insisted Arnold had to be involved in [2019’s] ‘Terminator: Dark Fate,’ and it was a great finish to him playing the T-800. There needs to be a broader interpretation of Terminator and the idea of a time war and super intelligence. I want to do new stuff that people aren’t imagining.”
Cameron had mentioned in previous interviews since 2019’s Terminator: Dark Fate, the final film in the franchise thus far, that he had “expressed frustration” in coming up with ideas for a new film, with the threats posed by A.I. changing much of his planning. However, he is still keen to tackle a modern Terminator story, saying:
“Once the dust clears on ‘Avatar’ in a couple of months, I’m going to really plunge into that…There are a lot of narrative problems to solve. The biggest is how do I stay enough ahead of what’s really happening to make it science fiction?”
When asked if he had cracked the story yet, Cameron added, “I’m working on it.”
Terminator: Dark Fate was a critical and commercial disappointment six years ago, with the film re-introducing Sarah Connor, played by Linda Hamilton, as well as Schwarzenegger as a new T-101, which saw the ending of Terminator 2: Judgment Day be retconned with John Connor’s murder and a new story unfolding. It also introduced us to Natalia Reyes‘ Dani Ramos, a young Mexican woman, who is expected to take over the John Connor mantle in the future as humanity’s saviour in a new timeline created by the events after Connor’s death.
Whether that will still be the jumping-off point for any new film, or if it will be a total reboot/revamp, remains to be seen or if it will “be back” at all.
Avatar: Fire and Ash hits cinemas on December 19th.
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