Arnold Schwarzenegger on why a new Conan film hasn’t happened

Last Updated on July 30, 2021

Over the decades, Arnold Schwarzenegger has returned to the role of the Terminator again and again, but there's one role which the actor hasn't played since 1984 – Conan the Barbarian. It's not for lack of trying, as the actor was slated to return for the role in what was being called THE LEGEND OF CONAN, but nothing has actually happened with the project. While speaking with TheArnoldFans, Schwarzenegger commented on the reasons behind the delay.

When it comes to the movie, the sad stuff about all of this is when there’s an estate like this, The Robert E. Howard estate…when someone buys these rights, those people now own the rights and they have their own vision of what they want to do and the guy that has the rights is some young guy and he’s trying to figure out how to get his way through Hollywood and this is not easy to do. So there are people that say to him, 'why don’t you start with a TV series and then he negotiates for a TV series and that falls apart. And then he goes maybe to Netflix and that falls apart. Then he decides to make a movie maybe…

"We have been trying to convince him for years now that the way to go is to come back and hire a really great director and to do another Conan movie and have me play King Conan, when Conan is like 70 years old and he's disgusted by sitting on the throne and being the king and then something happens after that," Schwarzenegger continued. "It’s really not that far from creating a finished script. The only one who really has to pull the trigger there is the people who own the Conan rights to do a movie. Let’s go to Netflix or whoever it is, let’s hire a director who’s very creative and can elevate the project to make it a winning project. I hope it will be done very soon because I think it’s a great idea." I could go without seeing Arnold Schwarzenegger as the Terminator yet again, but I would love to see the actor back as an aged Conan. Please make it happen.

Speaking of Terminator, Arnold Schwarzenegger will reprise the role in the upcoming film from Tim Miller (DEADPOOL) and James Cameron (AVATAR), which also finds Linda Hamilton returning as Sarah Connor. Production wrapped up last year, and Schwarzenegger spoke about working with both Miller and Cameron on the film.

It was a very interesting film to do with Tim, the dynamic, between him and with Jim Cameron producing. So Jim Cameron is right now directing Avatar films so he’s taken on this enormous challenge and he’s very busy with that BUT he’s a control freak and as you know, Terminator is kind of his baby so he does get involved in the filming so there were interesting discussions about which direction to go with a certain scene or how the dialogue should finish or what the certain look should be of an individual and all that stuff so there was a big collaboration between Jim and Tim Miller. I feel it was in good hands with both of them.

Schwarzenegger added that he's seen 15 minutes of the film and teased that it "looked great" and that he was "very excited" about it. The film, which according to James Cameron is going by the working title of TERMINATOR: DARK FATE, is set for a November 1, 2019 release.