Terminator Genisys Was Supposed To Start A Trilogy, Except It Was Awful
He'll be back. Sort of.
Around the time that Terminator Genisys was in the works, we were just getting used to the idea of another Terminator story in our lives.
Laeta Kalogridis and Patrick Lussier were handling Terminator Genisys screenwriting duties, and Arnold Schwarzenegger, the original Terminator, confirmed his involvement. It was definitely exciting times when it came to Terminator.
So what was the most natural bit of news to follow all of that? That Terminator Genisys would be completely independent of everything we knew and loved about the franchise. Of course!
And there were big plans where Terminator Genisys was concerned. At the time, it was said that Paramount Pictures was joining David Ellison’s Skydance Productions and sister Megal Ellison’s Annapurna Pictures in producing an all-new Terminator trilogy.
Not only were these two more movies than we were expecting, but they would stand alone. They wouldn’t necessarily be related to Cameron’s original films or the two that followed them. (Take that Rise of the Machines!)
At this point in the Terminator Genisys cycle, Arnold Schwarzenegger was something of an aging star, understandably far beyond the physical form he had in 1991, much less 1984. And the filmmakers wouldn’t need to explain how machines managed to gain weight and wrinkles. (That’s what this franchise is about, right?)
The reason why they were shooting for a trilogy starting with Terminator Genisys was because the film rights were going revert back to James Cameron in 2018.
And there’s no telling what the director would decide to do with the franchise at that point. Gotsta make that money while they can, you feel me?
Best laid plans and all, because Terminator Genisys didn’t start a trilogy, and barely made it as a movie in its own right.
But the Terminator Genisys time travel mechanics and plot twists were overly complicated, muddled, and made little sense, even for a Terminator movie. The acting, particularly from Jai Courtney as Kyle Reese and Emilia Clarke as Sarah Connor, was widely panned as unconvincing and lacking chemistry.
Terminator Genisys did make more than $400 million at the box office, but the critical and fan consensus was that this movie missed the mark in a bad way.
