James Cameron Talks Terminator, Avatar Sequels

James Cameron has made some boastful comments of late as to plans for two movie brands he helped shape into being: Terminator and Avatar. Apparently he wants to make four or five sequels set in the land of the blue giants, aka Pandora…but realistically, can he promise that many this far away from making just one?

No, he can’t, not really — and he’s aware of that. “Let’s face it, if Avatar 2 and 3 don’t make enough money, there’s not going to be a 4 and a 5,” he told Vanity Fair. It’s the first interview in months where he’s swallowed his pride and admitted he doesn’t control the entire Hollywood machine. He also says the new Terminator movie he’s working on is the first chapter in an intended trilogy, but that too is dependent on the box office.

“It’s the first of three, the story is mapped out over a three-film arc, but again, if we don’t make any money there isn’t gonna be a two and a three,” Cameron said. He knows what he’s saying. A recent attempt by Fox to reboot Terminator by themselves, subtitled Genisys, failed and all future plans in that direction were stuffed in a file cabinet.

This new Terminator series helmed by Cameron would not only utilize Schwarzenegger in his most famous role, but would also include Linda Hamilton in hers — possibly meaning everything post-T2 would be retconned. Cameron doesn’t comment on that, but he does talk a lot about his motive for telling a new Skynet story — he feels we’re closer than ever. “With the kind of wired world that we live in, where we’ve basically given away our privacy…it’s like we’re really on the cusp of an Orwellian Armageddon of inconceivable proportions. Therefore, I thought, hey, let’s make a movie about that.” He added, “So it’s going to be a very cheerful and upbeat kind of film.”

You can read the full interview with James Cameron at the Vanity Fair website.