The sixth movie in the franchise brought in an estimated $29 million over the weekend at the domestic box office – with its budget of $180 million, which won the weekend box office but is below the high $30 million to low $40 million projected opening the industry had for it. The result is comparable to 2015's "Terminator Genisys," which opened at $27 million over the July 4th weekend. The latest instalment of the Terminator franchise is also opening with just $28 million in China, which is still more than the $26.9 million opening day of Terminator: Genisys.
“Were we hoping for more? Of course,” Kyle Davies, Paramount’s president of domestic distribution, told the New York Times by phone on Sunday. “But we are proud of the movie. It truly delivers big action and big thrills. We tried to understand and honor what the fans wanted.”
Despite the focus on Hamilton and an all-new women cast instead of Arnold Schwarzenegger’s iconic and never-changing T-800 role, the film still failed to attract an audience. “Dark Fate” was reportedly plagued with production issues, including a bloated budget, script problems, creative battles between Cameron and director Tim Miller (“Deadpool”) and a set that went dark for days.
“Dark Fate” earned mixed reviews with a B-plus CinemaScore and a 69% “fresh” score on review aggregation site Rotten Tomatoes, proving that the general audience is just tired of “Terminator” movies and does not care about them much anymore.
