When you hear the name James Cameron, you instantly connect the filmmaker to his blockbuster films, which even the casual fan can name. Titanic, Avatar, and The Terminator each brought seismic shifts to the film industry, and Aliens and True Lies are action masterpieces with few equals. Cameron not only raised the bar for the Hollywood blockbuster, but his innovations also changed how movies were made.

An Ontario native, Cameron dropped out of California State University to pursue a career in filmmaking after seeing Star Wars in 1977. He landed his first major job working on B-movie producer Roger Corman's Star Wars-ripoff Battle Beyond the Stars, where he oversaw the film's special effects and art direction. His breakthrough film came in 1984, when he wrote and directed The Terminator, which became a surprise box office hit. That film made Cameron an A-list director, and a string of action classics followed.

Although Cameron is known for the films he directed, he also wrote several films that he didn't direct. Among those films are some surprising action and sci-fi classics that aren't necessarily associated with him. The following are six films (and one TV series) that you may not realize James Cameron wrote, listed in alphabetical order.

Alien Nation (1988)

The cast of Alien Nation
20th Century Studios

James Cameron isn't listed as a writer in the final credits for Alien Nation, but according to the American Film Institute, a draft of the screenplay filed in their library lists Cameron as the author of a rewrite of Rockne S. O'Bannon's (the creator of Farscape) script. Cameron was married to producer Gale Anne Hurd at the time, but why he isn't credited as a writer is unclear.

It's possible his rewrite was discarded, or he was contracted as a ghostwriter so that he wouldn't receive official credit. O'Bannon is the only writer credited on the underrated cult classic, which starred James Caan and Mandy Patinkin. A remake of Alien Nation has been in development for years, but Cameron is not involved.

Alita: Battle Angel (2019)

Rosa Salazar in Alita: Battle Angel
20th Century Fox

Alita: Battle Angel wasn't the phenomenon at the American box office which 20th Century Fox hoped for, although foreign grosses boosted its take to an impressive $400 million worldwide. A devoted fan base has been campaigning for a sequel, however, and they have a good argument. Cameron wrote a solid sci-fi flick, complimented with fantastic CGI and a nice supporting cast.

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Cameron, a fan of the Japanese manga the film is based on, had been developing Alita since the 1990s. His work on the Avatar sequels, however, prevented him from directing, so when the film was finally greenlit, Robert Rodriguez (Sin City) helmed the picture from Cameron's script, and he served as executive producer. The pair love the movie so much, they are committed to making a sequel one day.

Piranha II: The Spawning (1981)

Piranha II The Spawning james cameron
Saturn International Pictures / Columbia Pictures

Piranha II: The Spawning is the James Cameron movie that really isn't a James Cameron movie. Although credited as both the director and screenwriter, he was fired after only a few days of filming, and the producers changed the script significantly, adding scenes and dropping much of Cameron's work. While the film is mostly horrible, you see some flashes of his style, particularly in the piranha themselves, which were handmade by Cameron in what was technically his directorial debut. Despite the negative experience, he still jokingly refers to the film as the "finest flying piranha film ever made."

Point Break (1991)

Keanu Reeves and Patrick Swayze in Point Break
20th Century Fox

Point Break gains fans with each passing year, and you can thank Cameron for that. Before the film went into production, director Kathryn Bigelow was unhappy with the film's action sequences, and asked Cameron (her husband at the time) to help her rewrite it. His changes added many of the film's signature action scenes, as well as the iconic climax. However, neither he nor Bigelow took a writing credit. Cameron's particular reasoning was due to a dispute with the Writers Guild of America; he was supposed to be finishing the script for Terminator 2: Judgment Day at the time, and did not want producers to know he wasn't.

Point Break proved Keanu could be an action star, and the film changed his career path completely. Without Cameron's help, The Matrix, Speed, and John Wick would have been very different films, if they were even made at all.

Rambo: First Blood Part II

Sylvester Stallone in Rambo: First Blood Part II
TriStar Pictures

Rambo: First Blood Part II may have been one of the defining action films of the 1980s, but it would have been a much different movie had they stuck with Cameron, who wrote the film's first draft. His version of the script included a sidekick for Rambo that injected some humor into the story, as well as backstories of the POWs Rambo rescues. Stallone reportedly didn't like that his sidekick got all the best lines, so he re-wrote Cameron's script, eliminating the backstories and changing the sidekick to a female Vietnamese agent (played by Julia Nickson in the film).

Cameron claimed Stallone's rewrite kept his action sequences and cut everything else, while injecting a political slant. Stallone claimed the story needed to be simplified, and cut 30-40 pages that he said delayed the action. While the Cameron version sounds more interesting, Rambo ended up becoming a cultural phenomenon that spawned three more films and even a Rambo Day. As a result of the disagreement over Stallone's changes to the Cameron script, the pair never worked together again.

Related: How James Cameron Movies Reveal Corporations as Villains

Amazingly, Cameron was writing the scripts for Rambo, Aliens, and The Terminator all at the same time, in early 1984. That was only possible because the start of production of The Terminator was delayed until the end of February, allowing Cameron to work on two new scripts while making revisions on the Arnold Schwarzenegger classic. Cameron set up three desks, each with a typewriter, to separate the projects and help him focus.

Strange Days (1995)

Michael Wincott in Strange Days
20th Century Fox

Cameron has always had a knack for exploring the impact of technology on humanity, but his script for Strange Days was almost prophetic. His script imagined a world where people are addicted to virtual reality, a phenomenon that is less science-fiction and more science-fact these days. Cameron first conceived the story in the mid-1980s, but shelved the idea until 1991, when then-wife Kathryn Bigelow encouraged him to develop the story into a film.

With Cameron busy on other projects, he wrote a rudimentary script, basically a glorified treatment, and turned it over to Jay Cocks (who later wrote Gangs of New York) to flesh out the script and characters. The final screenplay was a bit uneven, as was the film, but you can easily see the intriguing 'Cameronian' sci-fi elements shine through. Bigelow directed the film, and Cameron produced, even though they had already divorced by that time.

Dark Angel (2000 TV Series)

Jessica Alba in Dark Angel
Fox

In 2000, James Cameron made his first foray into television, creating the sci-fi series Dark Angel. Most fans forget that he wrote the pilot episode of the series, so we've included it here. The show told the story of Max, a woman living in the near-future of 2019, and who is trying to hide her past as a genetically engineered government soldier. The series only lasted for two seasons, but it made Jessica Alba a star, so we should thank Cameron for that. At one point, the possibility of a Dark Angel movie was rumored, and although Alba voiced her willingness to do a film with Cameron, it never materialized.