Despite claims to the contrary, the Terminator franchise is not dead yet. Though reception has been poor for the last several films in the franchise, most notably for 2015’s Terminator: Genisys, excitement is high for the next installment thanks to the return of James Cameron and Linda Hamilton. And if star Arnold Schwarzenegger is to be believed, that excitement is well-warranted.
Arnie spoke to fan site The Arnold Fans where he revealed what it was like working on Terminator: Dark Fate with director Tim Miller, who is most famous for helming Deadpool, and the surprising amount of involvement from producer Cameron, who almost sounds like he co-directed the film. “It was a very interesting film to do with Tim … the dynamic, between him and with Jim Cameron producing. So Jim Cameron is right now directing Avatar films so he’s taken on this enormous challenge and he’s very busy with that, BUT he’s a control freak and as you know, Terminator is kind of his baby. So he does get involved in the filming,” Schwarzenegger said. “There were interesting discussions about which direction to go with a certain scene or how the dialogue should finish or what the certain look should be of an individual and all that stuff so there was a big collaboration between Jim and Tim Miller. I feel it was in good hands with both of them.”
Quite interesting that Cameron was so involved in the filming, and it really makes us believe that Dark Fate could give us a groundbreaking experience much like T2 did back in 1991. Also lending credence to that idea is the film’s blockbuster budget, which Arnold states is upwards of $200 million. “The budget was somewhere between 160 million and 200 million dollars. I couldn’t tell you exactly because the movie isn’t finished yet. It’s still being worked on,” the actor revealed. “Visual effects are being done now. I’ve seen 15 minutes and it looked great and I was very excited about it.”
If Arnold is excited about it, then we’re excited about it. Terminator: Dark Fate hits theaters on November 1.