After years of comments, rumors, half-starts, rumors about half-starts, and comments about those rumors, Independence Day 2 looks to be a real, happening sort of thing, thanks to the most quietly definitive signal Fox could provide: setting a release date. The slot is almost entirely what you’d expect — i.e., July 3, 2015 — and though it could be said to give Roland Emmerich and Dean Devlin proper time to work out a screenplay before shooting, the process shouldn’t be necessary. How long have they been talking about the scripting process, anyway?
For some grasp as to what will transpire nineteen years after the summer smash hit, pore over the details shared here. How we hope it brings another Smith–Goldblum pairing.
Fox made a few other decisions last night, the most immediate among them a switch regarding next summer. Not feeling content with how titles might perform in their allotted zones, the studio has shifted Dawn of the Planet of the Apes from May 23, 2014 to July 18; X-Men: Days of Future Past previously held the latter date, but now possesses the former. Further down the Fassbender line (ooh la la), Assassin’s Creed goes up a month, from May 22, 2015 to June 19. Unrelated to the actor (i.e., who cares), Peregrine’s Home for Peculiars — once a collaboration between Tim Burton and Jane Goldman, possibly no longer as much — comes on July 31, 2015.
The Weinstein Company, meanwhile, did a bit of shifting: Whereas August: Osage County would have arrived on November 8, the Oscar bait is getting an extra awards boost by landing on December 25; and because Grace of Monaco would have hit right around that same time, it’s found a different home with the November 27 slot. Studio strategies that speak for themselves.
Could you be anticipating Independence Day 2 any more strongly? Do you see these date shifts making any real impact?