Movies

I Know Now Why You Shrug: The 'Terminator Genisys' Sequel Has Been Seemingly Cancelled

terminator genisys sequel cancelled
By Jacob Hall

And just like that, the Terminator franchise may be finally, officially dead. For now.

Following poor box office, turgid reviews, and an audience response that amounted to little more than a shrug, Paramount has pulled the planned sequel to Terminator Genisys off its calendar. In its place is the upcoming Baywatch movie, which should allow you fully appreciate just how little faith the studio has in this once-mighty franchise. There is only one possible direction for this series to go next: a full-on remake in 2030 or so. It truly feels like all other options have been exhausted.

The news first came to our attention via The Hollywood Reporter's Borys Kit, who wasn't shy about sharing his opinion on this news. And we won't be shy either – this was clearly the right choice.

We've known that Terminator Genisys 2 (or whatever they planned on calling the next movie) was in trouble since it opened last summer, only grossing $89 million at the domestic box office. Although it ultimately did pretty solid business worldwide, those American numbers proved awfully hard to ignore and the sequels were supposedly put on hold "indefinitely." Then the word came down that the next movie was still in the works, but it was getting a "re-adjustment," which certainly sounds like code for "Oh my God, how do we fix this?" Now, months later, the answer is clearly that you don't. You can only beat a dead horse so many times before its rotting flesh crumbles underneath your fists.

Let's face it. This is probably for the best. If the return of star Arnold Schwarzenegger to his most iconic franchise couldn't rally the fans, then nothing will. And to be fair, the Austrian Oak was the best part of Genisys, which was ultimately brought down by just about everything else, especially a screenplay that went out of its way to erase the only two good movies in the series from its timeline. The first two Terminator films are legitimate masterpieces that hold up brilliantly today – the way Genisys gleefully kicks them out of canon is downright insulting.

Like so many (too many) movies these days, Terminator Genisys was originally pitched as the first in a new trilogy... which HitFix writer Drew McWeeny reminded us (as part of a much larger and very entertaining Twitter rant) was also the pitch for the Schwarzenegger-less Terminator: Salvation and the not-quite-as-bad-as-you-remember Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines.

And then IGN writer Eric Goldman chimed in with an excellent point.

Yep, a trilogy of first chapters that don't entice you into wanting to know what happens next. How truly, brutally sad.

We probably haven't seen the end of the Terminator franchise. They will make another one. Eventually. It may take a long time. It may come in the form of a RoboCop-esque remake that doesn't even try to exist in the same universe in the other movies. It will happen. But for now, it looks like Terminator Genisys has dealt the killing blow to a series that's been on life support for more than a decade. After all, the last movie didn't make Paramount happy, it didn't make fans happy, and it certainly didn't make Joe Schmoe moviegoer happy. Clinging to a series just because the name is famous is a fool's errand.

In the meantime, we can look forward to Baywatch on May 19, 2017. It's going to star Dwayne Johnson and Zac Efron. That sounds like fun, right?

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