2011’s The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo was a very enjoyable adaptation of an absolutely thrilling novel. Rooney Mara was excellent as Lisbeth Salander, Daniel Craig played a near perfect Mikael Blomkvist, and David Fincher’s direction led to an all-around awesome movie. Or at least that’s the way many fans saw it.

Sony on the other hand, was not so excited about the first film. While it did bring in over $200 million, that wasn’t enough to turn a profit, especially with a production budget of $90 million. Before The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, it would’ve seemed like a no-brainer that the sequel would happen. After all, the book trilogy is wildly successful and loved by its fans. But now, Sony has been extremely hesitant to press on with a full trilogy.

Then there came the word that Daniel Craig wanted more money. That makes sense considering Skyfall broke all sorts of box office records and brought in over $1 billion worldwide. He’s one of the hottest actors in the world right now, and deserves to be paid as such. But Sony wants to cut costs on this trilogy, not have them go up, so there’s been talk of writing Blomkvist out of the sequel, which is just ridiculous.

Now, the latest roadblock for The Girl Who Played With Fire is it looks like there’s next to no chance that David Fincher will be returning for the film. That news comes from a brief line at the end of an article about Fincher’s upcoming film Gone Girl. Check out that excerpt below.

Fincher’s chances of helming a sequel to Dragon Tattoo, which Sony shot on a $90 million budget, are all but dead.

If they end up making the movie without Fincher it will definitely be disappointing. The first film was very well directed, and it worked so well in large part because of the tone Fincher set. That being said, I’d much rather see the next film made without Fincher than not made at all, so if Fincher is absolutely not able to do it, it’s time to start looking for a new director. If the issue is in the budget, replacing the director is a viable option, writing out the main character is not, so I say keep Craig and find a less experienced director.

What do you think of Sony making The Girl Who Played With Fire without Fincher? Share your thoughts in the comments section below.