Will Smith not returning for Independence Day 2

Director Roland Emmerich (White House Down) has spent a lot of time talking up the sequels to the sci-fi box office smash Independence Day over the past few months, and now that 20th Century Fox has set a July 3rd, 2015 release date for the first of the two follow ups - tentatively titled ID Forever Part 1 - it finally seems that the long-rumoured project is about to become a reality. However, it will do so without Will Smith, with Emmerich confirming that the star won't be back to battle more aliens as Captain Steven Hiller.

"Will Smith can not come back because he's too expensive, but he'd also be too much of a marquee name," Emmerich tells the NY Daily News. "We have like maybe half of the people that you know would know from the first film (in the script) and the other half people who are new. I think some aliens will be back..."

The script for ID Forever has been written by Emmerich and his regular producing partner Dean Devlin and is currently undergoing a polish by James Vanderbilt (Zodiac, The Amazing Spider-Man). Emmerich has previously indicated that the sequel will take place some twenty years after the original as alien reinforcements arrive on Earth looking to complete the job they started back in 1996.