This year marks the 250th anniversary of the United States, and while we might be months away from the more official festivities that will be kicking off to honor the event, some Netflix fans seem to be getting into the spirit already. According to Netflix, which recently released its data that spotlights the most popular movies and TV shows on its service, the first week of February saw the 1996 Roland Emmerich film Independence Day climb into the #7 spot of most popular movies. Given that the movie debuted on the service on Feb. 1, it’s also possible that viewers don’t even know about what makes 2026 a significant year for the nation, and they merely wanted to watch Will Smith kick intergalactic butt.
It’s not only a significant year for America, but a significant year for the sci-fi blockbuster, as it celebrates its 30th anniversary this year. This means that it’s been 30 years since Smith went from small-screen talent to big-screen movie star, with the movie being his first of many crowd-pleasers. It wasn’t just Smith who reaped the rewards, as the movie’s accomplishments also helped boost the profiles of fellow stars Jeff Goldblum, Bill Pullman, and Vivica A. Fox, as well as writer/director Emmerich and his co-writer Dean Devlin.
‘Independence Day’ Helped Revive the Summer Blockbuster
There’s a long record of blockbusters debuting in the summer months, with the release of Jaws in 1975 and its overwhelming popularity even helping coin the term “blockbuster,” based on how audiences lined up around the block for tickets. This was followed by seminal movies like Raiders of the Lost Ark, E.T., Back to the Future, Batman, and Jurassic Park arriving in theaters in summer months and delighting swaths of viewers.
Still, the success of Independence Day is what helped solidify summer releases as the most profitable time to release cinema’s biggest spectacles. The release of the movie resulted in 1997’s Men in Black and Air Force One, 1998 gave us Saving Private Ryan and Armageddon, 1999 offered Star Wars: The Phantom Menace and The Mummy, and virtually every single summer after that gave us the year’s biggest releases. The trend has persisted, with recent years giving us summer releases like Top Gun: Maverick, Jurassic World Dominion, Barbie, Oppenheimer, and Deadpool & Wolverine.
A One-and-Done Success
Almost immediately after the release of Independence Day, reports emerged that Emmerich and Devlin hoped to expand the concept into a trilogy of movies. While it would take 20 years for Independence Day: Resurgence to happen, it did manage to bring back original cast members like Goldblum and Pullman. One glaring omission, though, was Smith, whose character was confirmed to have been killed between the events of the movies.
Frustratingly, Smith was signed on to the project for quite some time, with early versions of the script leaning heavily on his character. However, when Resurgence was preparing to shoot, Smith was offered the role of Deadshot in Suicide Squad, and his schedule didn’t allow him to do both, and the actor opted for the DC role, causing a number of complications with the narrative.
Resurgence didn’t meet the accomplishments of the original film either with audiences or critics, nor did it meet the achievements of even a standard blockbuster. It didn’t help that audiences had grown overwhelmed by the number of sequels hitting theaters every year, with that summer alone seeing the releases of Captain America: Civil War, Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising, X-Men: Apocalypse, Alice Through the Looking Glass, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows, The Conjuring 2, Now You See Me 2, Finding Dory, The Purge: Election Year, Star Trek Beyond, Ice Age: Collision Course, Jason Bourne, and Mechanic: Resurrection.
Even with an ending that teased the events of a third film, no official plans have been made about continuing the narrative in any capacity.
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