Is MGM Getting Ready To Hijack ‘Terminator 5′?
There’s no doubting that the Terminator franchise is a big one, so it may come as a surprise to you to learn that it is also the only franchise in which distributors aren’t locked in for future films.
Here’s the complicated story in the simplest way we can explain it.
Whilst Halcyon Company owns the Terminator rights MGM has a 30-day right of first refusal to finance and distribute Terminator based films (as a result of winning a lawsuit going way back to the first Terminator movie). Without getting into the lawsuit detail, the upshot is when Halcyon Company wants to make a new Terminator movie, the script has to go via MGM first.
With Terminator 4 (aka Terminator Salvation) Halcyon delivered an early script to MGM. MGM thought it sucked, thought it was too costly, thought it wouldn’t work without Schwarzenegger – whatever it was that was going through their minds in the end MGM decided they didn’t want the opportunity and passed on it. Sort of like what happened with Watchmen.
Along come a few other distributors that can see the potential – mainly Warner Bros. and Sony Pictures. In essence, it is thanks to WB and Sony that the film received the financing and distribution that it needed to become the success that its shaping up to be. Again, a lot like Watchmen.
Now with 20/20 hindsight, MGM have realized that the Terminator franchise has been resurrected and that the film is going to be hot – and that their decision to pass perhaps wasn’t such a good one. Or, you can look at it another way – that MGM’s decision to pass up on the risk of making Salvation literally opened up the cash cow of a sequel while passing the risk of that development onto Warner Bros. and Sony.
Either way it follows that Terminator 5 is shaping up to be hot and MGM know it. Word is that although Warner and Sony are credited with bringing Terminator films back from the dead it is MGM that wants it back and, well, MGM still hold the right to first refusal of the next Terminator script – so legally it seems they can get it back.
That’s right. Although Terminator Salvation exists thanks to Warner Bros. and Sony (primarily), they may not even get a look in at the sequel. Crazy huh?
Where does this leave Terminator 5? Who knows because Halcyon and MGM are refusing to comment. As it stands when it comes to a Terminator Salvation sequel Halcyon will want to produce it, McG will want to direct it and Christian Bale will star in it. The only question is will MGM finance and distribute it? If so, it may be another fine example of where what is legal isn’t necessarily what is moral.
Watchmen anyone?
Source: Variety
