James Cameron admitted his mistakes in the box office failure of ‘Terminator: Dark Fate’ which was released in 2019. But what are they?
Sometimes when James Cameron is the producer of a film, he pushes things. Director Tim Miller paid the price for Terminator: Dark Fate, which hit theaters in 2019. And not necessarily for the better.
Dark Fate takes place chronologically just a few years after the events of Terminator 2, then jumps back 22 years and features Sarah Connor coming to the aid of a certain Dani who is being hunted by an advanced Terminator, the “Rev-9”. With the help of the T-800, who has been left aimlessly on Earth and has established a family life for himself, she goes to protect Dani.
20th Century Fox Linda Hamilton as Sarah Connor
The film flopped, the worst box-office hit of any film in the saga. Today, at the microphone of Deadline, James Cameron – producer and co-writer of the film – makes his mea culpa:
I think the problem is mine for refusing to do it without Arnold [Schwarzenegger]. Tim didn’t want to [de lui], but I said, ‘Look, I don’t want that. Arnold and I have been friends for 40 years and I could hear him saying from here, ‘Jim, I can’t believe you’re doing a Terminator movie without me.
He pursues:
“I think what happened is that the movie could have survived with Linda, or it could have survived with Arnold. But if you put Linda and Arnold together, she’s in his 60’s, he’s in his 70’s. Suddenly it’s not your Terminator movie anymore. It wasn’t even your father’s. It was Grandpa Terminator and we didn’t see it.”
For his part, Tim Miller told Collider in 2019 that he no longer wants to find himself in a situation where he doesn’t “have the control to do what I think is the right thing to do.” Then he confided:
Fox of the twentieth century
“Even though Jim and David Ellison are the producers and they technically have the final cut and ultimate power, my name as a director lives on. And even though I’m going to lose the fight… I feel compelled to fight because that’s what a director should do. Fight for the film.”
Keep in mind that Miller also threw in the towel from the Deadpool saga after various visions of Marvel’s loud-mouthed mercenary.
When it was released in theaters, Terminator: Dark Fate cost Twentieth Century Fox nearly $120 million.