Director Alan Taylor wants us all to know that he is only rumored (he’s under personal policy to say that it’s a rumor) to be directing TERMINATOR 5 so any ideas given hence forth may or may not come to fruition.
That out of the way, when the helmer of THOR: THE DARK WORLD was interviewed by /Film and Film School Rejects, there were a few interesting tidbits about where Taylor would take the rebooted franchise.
He began by talking to /Film about how the news of his involvement spread so quickly with the online community:
Funny thing was it came out really early, a reminder of what the blogosphere can do. I had one conversation, didn’t tell anyone and then all of a sudden, BOOM, it was online the next day. So my agent said, ‘You probably should know [this is gonna come up].’ It’s progressed a lot since then, but I’m still officially going to call it a rumor.
Now when Taylor states that he’s drawing inspiration from Christopher Nolan‘s Batman franchise, he’s not saying “darker and edgier”. He’s actually talking about respecting the original work:
We all love the first two and I actually went back and watched them again and my respect level only went up. I think there is another famous franchise that had a wonderful beginning and then turned a little bananas….Tim Burton’s first Batman is just glorious and by the time it got around to nipples on costumes and all that stuff it sort of lost its way. And for [Christopher] Nolan to come in an say ‘I respect this material so much I’m going to take it up to *here,* that’s a great inspiration.’ I think any version, whoever is directing Terminator, would be very respectful and serve the first two and probably feel a bit more freedom by the end.
This thought was continued in the interview with Film School Rejects:
The funny thing is, those [first] two films could not be more different than each other. The first one was more of a low-budget horror movie, while the second one was more an amazingly well-produced, glossy thriller with a sci-fi concept. They were both so successful, so there’s certain things you learn from them. If you’re going to try and enter the franchise, you better try to come in at that level. Also, it’s a challenging thing, because what they have in mind is a reboot but not an entirely different way of thinking.
If Taylor does direct the new TERMINATOR, and it sounds like he’s definitely put a lot of thought into it as a “rumored” contender. I believe he’s on the right page when it comes to his outlook on how the next franchise should be approached.
Do you agree with Taylor? Where should the TERMINATOR go next?