The movie Terry Crews instantly regretted making: “Are the Jonas Brothers in this thing now?”
There are myriad reasons why an actor might regret appearing in a movie, but nothing will make them regret it as much as being cut from the film entirely, especially when it’s a film in a franchise as iconic as The Terminator, and it’s a feeling of which Terry Crews is well aware.
Crews was set to appear in the fourth instalment of the sci-fi franchise, Terminator Salvation, as Captain Jericho, telling the AV Club, “I did a scene, and it was understood that it was a great scene. I did my thing. I was a captain, and I was yelling and screaming and cussing”.
If you’ve watched the movie, you might be thinking, I would remember Terry Crews being in Terminator Redemption, or, I thought that corpse looked familiar, and both would be completely justified, because Crews’ part was chopped, except for a quick closeup of his dead body.
What’s even worse is that apparently, he didn’t find out until the premiere! Imagine pulling up to a premier for a Terminator film, you’re suited and booted, excited to see your scene, the movie opening and then sitting confused looking for yourself only for a quick pan to you dead, as Christian Bale exclaims, “Holsten, there’s something wrong up here”.
Yeah, no shit, Christian; it’s bad enough that they cut Crews’ role without telling him, but there’s something about keeping the corpse that’s really flogging a dead horse. There is literally a bit in Friends about this, and what’s devastating is that you can tell the pan to Captain Jericho was meant to be a reveal.
The way the camera lingers on him specifically, instead of, say, a random pile of dead bodies, tells us that we are meant to feel something here. Not a lot because it’s one scene, but we’re meant to feel the boomerang impact of ‘Oh, cool, Terry Crews!’, which turns into, ‘Oh my god, he’s dead already’.
And it doesn’t stop there. Crews provided the reasoning he was given for his cut scene, explaining, “Someone had the brilliant idea to make a Terminator movie PG-13. There’s never been a PG-13 Terminator movie. Since when are they trying to make this for kids?”
He continues by acknowledging that that’s showbiz, and well, showbiz needs the money. “It’s part of the biz, but I was very disappointed,” the actor admitted, “I was like, ‘Wait a minute, they’re trying to sell toys? Are the Jonas Brothers in this thing now?’” If ever there was a sick burn…
But to be honest, Terminator Salvation isn’t worth the heartache. The film did poorly at the box office, being the first of the franchise to not make number one in the US, and it was critically panned. It was the definition of a flop that not even its all-star cast, including Christian Bale, Bryce Dallas Howard and Helena Bonham Carter could salvage.
