Easily the single biggest selling point of Tim Miller’s Terminator: Dark Fate was that it was a direct sequel to Terminator 2, with Linda Hamilton reprising the role of Sarah Connor for the very first time since James Cameron’s sequel. Hamilton returned to the role after so many years because she felt the film gave her new material to work with, she noted last year.
Alas, the film’s massive budget all but ensured that Dark Fate won’t be spawning the sequels Cameron and the team hoped to make; made on a production budget somewhere in the ballpark of $185 million, Dark Fate pulled in $261 million at the box office. Speaking with THR this week, Hamilton took a dig at the budget that set the film up for financial failure.
“I would really appreciate maybe a smaller version where so many millions are not at stake. Today’s audience is just so unpredictable,” Hamilton explained to THR.
“It should definitely not be such a high-risk financial venture, but I would be quite happy to never return. So, no, I am not hopeful because I would really love to be done.”
Hamilton did make sure to add, however, “But, if there were something new that really spoke to me, I am a logical person, and I will always consider viable changes.”
In other words, don’t call Hamilton a hypocrite if she ever does play Sarah Connor on screen again, but she’s not exactly looking forward to that possibility. And please, studios, listen to what she’s saying here about the absurd spending you’re doing on movies like Dark Fate. A smaller, more intimate, Logan-style sequel centered on Sarah Connor, and made on a fraction of Dark Fate‘s budget, probably would’ve been the box office hit that the Terminator franchise needed last year. Not everything needs to be a massive, ridiculously expensive CGI spectacle.
A film that made nearly $300 million should never not be profitable.
