Independence Day is a movie I genuinely adored as a kid, and ironically love as an adult. It’s got all the best ingredients of a ’90s blockbuster – Will Smith, explosions, aliens and a dog jumping out of a fireball. Sure, there are some Grand Canyon-sized plot holes and, well, everything mentioned here, but it certainly is fun to watch aliens blow up cities.

Gamma Squad reports that Roland Emmerich has been working on scripts for two back-to-back sequels to ID4 since 2009, and in that time Fox has been trying to wrangle Smith into returning to his old role, though Big Willie hasn’t been very receptive to their offers:

“Fox started working on structuring a deal to sign him back in early 2009, but the world’s last bankable action star was seeking $50 million to shoot both ID2 and ID3 back-to-back, and Fox balked at so large a price tag in combination with Emmerich’s own hefty salary demands to direct.”

While no one’s ready to give up on The Fresh Prince yet, Fox has stated they’re willing to go through with production with our without Smith, and that the two sequels will be able to function as standalone movies.

All of this is irrelevant, of course, unless they can bring back Jeff Goldblum…