Considering the small hints that McG has shared regarding the alternate ending, it’s possible that it could wrap up with John dying during the base operation or even Marcus betraying John and killing him.
Of course, with McG keeping his lips sealed concerning the details, we can only speculate on how dark this ending might end up going. As for the legacy of “Terminator Salvation,” McG’s spirits aren’t broken quite yet, though it’s clear that it still haunts him. “We tried hard,” he recalled. “On that one, we brought in Jonah Nolan to write it; there was a writers’ strike back then.”
“[We] brought in Christian Bale, you can’t reach much higher than that,” the filmmaker went on. “We certainly gave it everything we had. A lot of people like that movie; it didn’t quite do what I hoped it was gonna do, and I’ve been living with that wound a long time.” Even still, perhaps audiences may think differently of the much-maligned film if this alternate conclusion is eventually released. Until the day when that possibility becomes a reality, however, all we can do is wonder.
