The pass-the-parcel on the rights to the “Terminator” franchise, which have been owned by more or less everyone in Hollywood at this point (we even believe that Luis Guzman held them for an hour and 45 minutes in 2005), shows no sign of letting up. After current rights holder Halycon went bankrupt last year, it looked for a while that Lionsgate had secured the series, with a bid of $15 million, plus 5% of future grosses.
Yesterday, however, was the final day for submitting bids (the auction is on Monday), and, according to Variety, Sony Pictures snuck in with a submission at the last minute. The studio already held international rights to “Terminator: Salvation,” which proved far more profitable than the film’s rather meager domestic gross, so they presumably think there’s more money to be made here.
Even if Sony do retain the rights (we imagine they’ll have put up more money than Lionsgate, although apparently the latter will get $750,000 even if they lose the auction — man, why doesn’t eBay work like that?), we think it’s unlikely that the ‘Salvation’ take on the franchise will be continued, unless McG can do it for half a million dollars, recasts Dean Cain as John Connor, and releases it straight to Netflix. Whoever wins, we smell yet another remake/reboot in the works… Might as well make it 4D for good measure.
