Though he’d wanted the big guy to appear in the movie – and had asked him to be involved – Producer Robert Rodriguez says he wasn’t able to convince Arnold Schwarzenegger to reprise his role as Major Alan “Dutch” Schaefer in ”Predators”.

The Arnold Fans reports that Rodriguez was so keen on having Schwarzenegger cameo in the film (he’d written a scene for him near the film’s end – good scene it would’ve been too!) that “[he] even offered to push back the movie’s production start date until after Arnold had vacated the Governor’s mansion.”

At the end of the day, seems Schwarzenegger just didn’t have the time. It’s not the first time the Governor has knocked back the chance to reprise his role as ‘Dutch’ – he also turned down the chance to reprise the role in Stephen Hopkins’ “Predator 2″ (1990). Schwarzenegger’s part was ultimately rewritten as a new character, played by Gary Busey.

As disappointing as it is that Schwarzenegger won’t be appearing in the film (even more so because he agreed to do the abysmal ”Terminator Salvation” but didn’t have time for this) I think it’s safe to say “Predators” going to work out just fine anyway – especially if the trailer is anything to go by…