Things are not looking good for the #Terminator franchise as its latest film, “Terminator: #DarkFate”, opened this past weekend to a measly North American box office take of $29-million and only $94.6-million overseas, for a worldwide total of just over $123-million. With a massive $185-million budget, combined with another $80 to $100-million in global marketing and distribution fees, experts are predicting that the film could lose as much as $100-million.
Since Paramount, Skydance and Disney (through 20th Century Fox) co-financed the movie, any potential damages will be broken up among the Hollywood companies, which each put up 30% of the budget. China’s Tencent contributed the remaining 10%. Box office experts say the film needs to earn around $450-million to break even, but predict that “Terminator: Dark Fate” will end its box office run with an uninspiring $180- to $200-million globally.
Paramount and Skydance (the companies responsible for releasing “Dark Fate” domestically) hoped that it would kick off with over $40-million in North America, but after it fell short of expectations, insiders at rival studios suggest it’s unlikely “Dark Fate” will hit triple digits in the U.S. It might not even pass $70-million domestically over the course of its entire theatrical run, which is rather sad.
The film’s predecessors, 2009’s “Terminator Salvation” and 2015’s “Terminator Genisys”, were both panned by critics and failed to recoup their pricey budgets. So, in spite of the return of James Cameron as producer and original stars Arnold Schwarzenegger and Linda Hamilton, “Terminator: Dark Fate” failed to reignite moviegoers’ interest.
Media analyst Eric Handler with MKM Partners said,
“This is an aging franchise with aging actors, and the reviews were mediocre. As good of a franchise as this might have been, it doesn’t have the same appeal now.”
“It is time to let this franchise finally go to the great beyond.”
Adds Jeff Bock of Exhibitor Relations said,
“This is definitely the end of the line for the Terminator franchise in its current iteration. That said, IPs are harder to kill off than Jason Vorhees these days. So, expect a new series in five years on CBS All Access. Probably animated this time.”
The fan reaction thus far isn’t great either with the film only earning a 6.6 score on IMDb and a Metacritic score of only 54%.
Sci-Fi & Fantasy Fans Society 
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