Die Hard, meet Terminator, welcome to the castrated 4th club. We learn this morning that the next Terminator is slotted to be PG-13 thanks to the professionals at Variety:
As production starts today on “Terminator Salvation: The Future Begins,” the next installment in the action franchise, producers at the Halcyon Co. say they aim to deliver a PG-13 movie to Warner Bros. for release on May 22, 2009. The “Terminator” series is one of the highest-grossing R-rated franchises of all time, with the first three films having grossed more than $1.03 billion worldwide. But Halcyon producers thought it was time to broaden the upcoming fourth film’s audience base, and they believe the PG-13 won’t compromise the series’ gritty vision.
“The ratings have changed,” said Halcyon co-founder and co-CEO Victor Kubicek, a broker-turned-writer-producer. “The PG-13 has increased in intensity.” A family-friendly rating opens many doors, including a “Terminator Salvation” licensing deal for action figures with Playmates Toys.
Yea, well….this certainly sounds like bullshit. Why the fuck would you take a series that has been restricted and make the fourth installment PG-13? Oh wait, for toy deals! Fuck that shit. I was looking forward to this film, and now I am certainly skeptical about this team’s desire to stay true to the original series at all.
I could be over reacting. The truth is, violence against machines gets a much lesser rating than violence against people; perhaps the film will be everything we want it to be at PG-13, I am just very skeptical. I think Restricted is probably the rating you need to work with when you are dealing with the topic of human extermination. I just can’t see PG being able to handle that subject well, perhaps if the robots just spanked everyone (with their pants on).
This news certainly raises red flags for me, and my anticipation for the film has certainly lessened some. Do you guys feel the same way – or is it no big deal?
As long as an unrated directors cut comes out to blu ray, that has all the foul language and intense scenes… I guess it’s ok. But if they don’t do that, their basically screwing the routes of the franchise big time. I mean, a 4th installment should be crazier than the old one’s, so how can it go P-13? Even if the battle scenes are mostly against robots, and this falls under less strict ratings… do they plan on just not showing anyone get killed by the robots in a realistic and awful way that we would experience if we were actually there?
And who in the world wouldn’t friggin swear after robots who are trying to take over the world, if this were to really happen? I think anyone would want to scream a big F You to them if they could.
So why broaden the audience if it will make the films quality suffer and make it seem watered down? If it’s actually for the toy license and that… I’m sorry but this is truly a sad year for any true Terminator fan. Don’t get me wrong, the movie may still be great and I do want to see it… but I just don’t understand how a R rated franchise that did so well, can change to P-13…
Please, if you have any brains at all… release a unrated more intense version of this film to Blu-Ray, so all the die-hard fans can have something to be excited about.
-Terminator Fan
One word- flexibility. The key to this being a PG-13 is that it limits the flexibility of the film.
It restricts things, boundaries appear – Terminator 1 & 2 didnt have boundaries, and 2 great films resulted. Terminator 3 did, and it was rubbish.
I expect this will be the same.
I’m sorry to hear that T-4 is going to be PG-13. I’ll still see it once. But back in the day, I saw the othr releases several times. I don’t see how a movie that deals with human extermination at the hands of machines can be anything other than an R rated film, hard R at that.(I mean why don’t they just make a movie about Auschwitz and make it G rated so that all the kiddies get in to soften up the subject of genocide. They can have Mickey Mouse play Dr. Mengele.) In my opinion T-4 has to have no pity, or mercy or remorse for the audience. I want blood and flying body parts strewn across the silver screen. I want to see man-kind fighting tooth and nail to find a way to survive the onslaught. Anything else is just more Hollywood bullshit. In short the directors have sold out. My only hope is that sky net sends a team of terminators from the future to take these wimps out and restore Arnie to his original cult bad-ass terminator status. Oh and if you disagree, Faock U Aussholes!! I’ll be back!
It could work. PG-13 films work good most times, and some of them lead me to question why they got suck a rating (hem hem…BEOWULF)
thats fuking stupid…
terminators always been rated r and i feel that in order to depict the 4th movie they should keep it that way….
aslo the r rating has kept the terminator movies exiting … without that blood and gore its just not going to be the same
& yet somehow i feel the Cap’n’s prediction on Conan will come to pass.
Why do you even suggest such blasphemy Cap’n
a pox on thee!
All I know is that with this as the going trend (turning R rated properties into PG-13 rated properties), I can’t wait to hear Doug’s rant when they announce the new PG-13 Conan movie!!!!!
@John Die Hard 4 was just some exploding simple shooting and running action movie and I didn’t like it very much. jumping on a jet? from a brigde? thats too much even for John McLane. James Bond could that but not McLane… I just thought that was too much the first one is the best one
Terminator should be a slaughtering killing ripping fucking cool movie how do you do that when it’s PG13 these news are horrible :-( :-(
really sad
Alex
germany
this is alil concerning but if bale trusts it i trust it!! lol
craig
uk
Bale is on board and like Doug mentioned Robot on Robot action can be quite extreme with the PG-13 rating. I don’t consider this to be bad news, a movie doesn’t need to be R to have quality. Terminator and Terminator2 could be rated pg-13 by todays standards (profanity being the only real issue).
So they can’t say fuck and there won’t be raining blood, big deal. Terminator The Sarah Connor Chronicles has proved Terminator can work without being overly violent. I bet that if Terminator 1 was released today and they removed the tit-shot of Linda Hamilton it also would have been rated PG-13
(Type your comment here. Make sure you’ve read the commenting rules before doing so)I think It would be ok to have a pg 13 terminator because for me it was’nt about the blood and gore, it was about the special effects.
Hey Phil Gee – yes, kids can get into an R-rated movie with a parent or guardian.
However by making it PG-13 you will get a larger range of teen who may have a strict parent who won’t take them. And you know…those were my parents and I didn’t see ONE rated R movie until I was 17 years old. ;)
Please kids have always seen a movie they wanted to see, if they wanted it bad enough. My movie going experience in recent years is more and more parents don’t care what kind of movie they bring their kids to see.
Making this movie PG-13 places yet another nail into the coffin for this film. I honestly expect it to be a piece of crap just like everything else McG touches.
The PG-13 issues isn’t a big deal. The last Die Hard movie proved that.
If this movie is a PG-13 release, I won’t see it. I have no interest in a PG-13 Terminator movie just like I didn’t have any interest in a PG-13 Alien vs. Predator movie (still haven’t seen those).
It’s just the world we live in today. I remember my Mum getting me the T2 action figures when the movie came out (a film i couldn’t see because of it’s rating) and didn’t mind. I also don’t seem to remember the Matrix box office being impacted one bit by them being R rated films.
I was under the impression that in the US, kids could still get into an R rated movie as long as accompanied by an adult. Apparently that’s not true anymore (if it ever was).
It’s when they do another Robocop as PG13 that i draw the line.
That is just fuckin gay
well.. Fuck you asshole! *rips victors heart out*
This is a bad sign. I want to see people die horrible and bloody deaths, otherwise it’s just not a Terminator film.
I say (cautiously) that this isn’t a big deal.
never a good sign if product tie-ins & merchandising are of a higher priority than film quality. can anyone say Dungeons & Dragons ? :-)