Warner Bros. just finished surviving an epic battle for the rights to a tentpole movie, eventually convincing Fox to let them release Watchmen to the tune of a pretty large chunk of the profits. And now they will wind up facing a pretty similar challenge from MGM, which has the right to take future Terminator sequels from the Warners without much of a fight.

It's all because of a lawsuit settled between MGM and Halcyon, the movie's producers, which is spelled out in a Variety piece today. Basically, MGM turned down the rights to make Terminator: Salvation when all they had to go on was a pretty crappy early script by John Brancato and Michael Ferris and the knowledge that Arnold Schwarzenegger wouldn't be returning. As we all know, the script underwent some rewrites, McG found a way to include Schwarzenegger after all, and what looked like a ridiculous attempt to continue the Terminator franchise turned into a viable summer movie after all.

Now MGM has the right to get a piece of the action, and there's a pretty good chance they'll take it. Of course, a huge franchise like this isn't something they can necessarily afford, given that they're already committed to The Hobbit and Aronofsky's Robocop remake, and haven't had a huge string of hits lately. And given that Warner Bros. has earned a reputation for letting directors make the giant-budget films they want to make (The Dark Knight, Watchmen, and to a lesser extent even Terminator: Salvation), will an MGM Terminator manage to be as satisfying?

Variety says we won't even see this drama play out for another year, which gives Terminator: Salvation a long time to make its mark. In the end, putting McG and John Connor at a new studio might not make a difference for anything except MGM's bottom line.