Will Smith’s lovable demeanor will be present only in the first Independence Day as the actor will not be returning for the sequel. According to Deadline, Smith will not be reprising his role as Captain Steven Hiller. Sad, considering that Independence Day was one of the main reasons why Will Smith has become one of the top actors in Hollywood today. 20th Century Fox has in mind a number of sequels for the 1996 film but for now only one movie is a certainty.
Director Roland Emmerich wants to premiere the movie in 2016 on the 4th of July thus marking 10 years since the original premiered. The plot of the first movie dealt with a full scale alien invasion that crippled the world and leveled our cities to the ground. As for the second movie, the plot is still undecided. Emmerich and Dean Devlin,the writer of the original, had written a draft that was passed on to The Amazing Spider-man’s scribe James Vanderbilt. The result were two scripts, one where the action would happen at the alien’s doorstep and the other one where Will Smith is the protagonist. Seems like one of these two will likely be left out seeing as Smith is not interested in returning. This is, by no means a done deal, as there is still a matter of settling the deal with Emmerich to direct the film. But once that will be over, casting will continue and maybe, just maybe, Will Smith will reconsider.
The alien-invasion flick debuted strongly wordlwide and garnered a generated sum of over 800 million dollars. With a success like that, it’s amazing how a sequel took so long to be put into motion. Will Smith is busy at the moment with Warner Bros.’s Focus while another project will soon pop un in the actor’s agenda an that is Sony Picture’s reboot of Men in Black. Yes, Smith will once again sport the black suit and tie as Jay. The film is currently slated for a June 24 2016 release date, but Emmerich has stated clearly that he wants to maintain the tradition and release it on the fourth just like the original. But first he still needs to be confirmed as a director. Something that is somewhat of a certainty.