Prior to the release of Terminator: Dark Fate, many suspected that Linda Hamilton’s iconic longtime franchise heroine Sarah Connor might not make it to the credits. After all, the actress has taken long periods of retirement from the role and it took James Cameron himself to convince her that the project was worthwhile.
However – minor spoilers to follow – the ending of Dark Fate potentially sets up the character continuing in a mentor role to Natalia Reyes’ Dani. But would she return for another tussle with the time-travelling killer robots? Well, when asked by an interviewer, Hamilton refused to be pinned down, claiming:
“You know, it’s not up to me. I choose my work based on story and character, so if it’s there and it’s good enough, I would want to do it.”
Thing is, there may not be a Dark Fate sequel for her to return for. Despite the film being generally considered the best installment in the franchise since Terminator 2: Judgment Day, it was sped through production as there may be an impending rights battle on the horizon. Horror fans will know that there’s currently a protracted tussle over the Friday the 13th rights, which centers on whether the IP in a script will revert to the control of the original author after 35 years.
The current ruling is in favor of the author, which means there’s a good chance that the Terminator rights may soon be controlled by James Cameron and Gale Anne Hurd. And if he did get them, it’s anyone’s guess what he’d want to do. There’s a chance he could simply license Terminator back to Paramount, but he may decide that he wants to take another stab at it some way down the line, and given that he’s got four Avatar sequels in production, that could mean quite a wait.
In the meantime, I’d recommend checking out Terminator: Dark Fate. I’d pretty much written the franchise off after Genisys, but this is quite the comeback.