Today has been a rather big one for the production of Roland Emmerich’s Independence Day: Resurgence. Not only has the movie announced its official title and revealed new plot details, but now we have our first look at two of the powerful space crafts that will be utilized by some of the lead characters in the blockbuster:
20th Century Fox officially released the image you see above, which is the vehicle that has been identified as The Moon Tug. More specifically, this is moon-based piece of operational equipment that is used in the movie by Jake Morrison – the new character being played by Liam Hemsworth. Check out another look at the vehicle behind director Roland Emerich in the image below...
During a special press conference held today with the entire cast and the director of Independence Day: Resurgence, Hemsworth revealed not only some new details about his role, but also how he wound up taking the helm of The Moon Tug. According to the actor, Jake was orphaned at a young age because his parents were killed during the 1996 alien invasion, and he grew up in an orphanage and eventually joined the military. He grew to become an ace fighter pilot, but that’s where he found himself in trouble. Hemsworth explained,
His ego kind of got in the way, and he made a bad mistake, a bad decision. He kind of put someone’s life at risk, and he got the great job of driving this Moon Tug – which is basically a forklift on the moon, where he gets to move around different pieces on the moon, which is not really an exciting job for a fighter pilot like himself.
So what would Jake prefer to be flying instead? That would be one of the military’s hybrid jets – one of which our own Sean O’Connell actually snapped a picture of on the set of Independence Day: Resurgence:
The reason this is called a hybrid jet is because it is partially made with alien technology that wound up being left over after the invasion of 1996. This is a detail that Roland Emmerich has been talking about for years, so it’s pretty cool to see one of them actually come to life. While Jake dreams about flying one of these jets again, we will instead largely see them piloted by Dylan Hiller (Jessie Usher) - the step-son of Will Smith’s Captain Steven Hiller from the first movie – and Rain, a character played by Chinese actress Angelababy.
It will probably be a while before we actually get to see these two vehicles in action, as Independence Day: Resurgence is still very much in the midst of production out in Albuquerque, New Mexico. That being said, the film’s June 24, 2016 release date will probably be here before we know it.
