The Reddit thread certainly isn’t wrong in pointing out Emilia Clarke’s string of bad luck with franchises. When it came time to reboot the “Terminator” franchise again, Paramount Pictures tapped Clarke to play Sarah Connor in 2015’s “Terminator: Genisys,” replacing Linda Hamilton. Directed by veteran “Game of Thrones” director Alan Taylor, “Genisys” was a critical flop and received a middling response from audiences, who gave the action film a mediocre B+ CinemaScore. The film fell into relative obscurity following its release and failed to restart the franchise properly. While speaking with Vanity Fair in 2018, Clarke discussed how she was “relieved” that she didn’t have to continue on with the “Terminator” franchise, citing how a troubled production led to “no one ha[ving] a good time.”
But Clarke’s relationship with sci-fi fare didn’t end there, as 2018 saw the release of “Solo: A Star Wars Story” — the biggest box office misfire in “Star Wars” history. As the same Reddit post reads, the film was “a box office disappointment and faded into the aether […] and Clarke’s character was set up for a future arc that we most certainly won’t be seeing.”
In “Solo,” which lost over $50 million, Clarke played Qi’ra, the love interest of Han Solo (Alden Ehrenreich). When asked if she’d return as Qi’ra, Clarke remained coy with IndieWire. “I mean … no,” Clarke said laughingly in January 2023. “That would be lovely, that would be very nice,” the “Game of Thrones” star continued, before discussing how she was enjoying working in the Marvel Cinematic Universe — a career move that doesn’t seem to have panned out either.
