One of the movies that really helped launched Will Smith's highly lucrative acting career was the sci-fi film "Independence Day," but the actor will not be reprising his role as fighter pilot Captain Steve Hiller in the rebooted "Independence Day Resurgence."
So what happened? According to Cinema Blend, all things were going smoothly for the sequel and director Ronald Emmerich was even very positive about Smith's involvement in the film.
"In the very beginning, I wanted to work with him and he was excited to be in it but then after a while he was tired of sequels, and he did another science fiction film, which was his father-son story, so he opted out," said Emmerich.
The other science fiction film Emmerich was referring to was none other than "After Earth," which Smith did with his son Jaden. To recall, the movie was a flop and Smith even considered it as the "most painful failure" of his career.
"'Wild Wild West' was less painful than 'After Earth' because my son was involved in 'After Earth' and I led him into it. That was excruciating," he admitted to Esquire. "What I learned from that failure is how you win. I got reinvigorated after the failure of 'After Earth.'"
"Independence Day Resurgence" will put the spotlight on a new lead character - Dylan Hiller (played by Jessie Usher), who is the son of Smith's Hiller. The story will take 20 years after the original film, where alien forces will be back to wreak havoc on Earth. The aliens managed to send a distress signal before they were destroyed and now their allies are looking for revenge.
The movie's co-writer and producer Dean Devlin said that the writing process for the sequel actually makes a lot of sense without Smith. Emmerich added that they will deal with Hiller's "disappearance" in the sequel in a "very respectful way." His character "is still part of this universe," but that does not mean that the character will be doing a cameo.
Even though Smith won't be back in "Independence Day Resurgence," other stars of the original film will be including Jeff Goldblum, Bill Pullman, and even Vivica A. Fox. Liam Hemsworth will be playing a new character named Jake Morrison, who is the son-in-law of former U.S. President Thomas J. Whitmore.
20th Century Fox has officially scheduled Independence Day 2 to hit theaters on June 24, 2016.
