- Advertisement -

MOVIE NEWS: Terminator Genisys

The Terminator franchise is a discombobulated mess and Terminator: Genisys is not really making things much better.

It’s hard to determine what really is canon anymore especially given the latest twist in trailer reveal for Terminator: Genisys.

Spoiler alerts from here on out.

- Advertisement -

Make no mistake, James Cameron‘s first two Terminator movies were masterpieces. The first movie establishes the characters, presented the threat and ultimately the machine’s future was crushed.

Naturally, Sarah Connor wouldn’t think to bother cleaning up that mess as pieces from the Terminator itself was still very much available to build the foundation that was Cyberdyne which leads to the loose ends for the second movie.

Now as a recurring theme of the film is, “there’s no fate but what we make,” which means nothing is really set as long as you have the means to change. It’s a staple for many time-traveling stories.

Terminator 2: Judgment Day was arguably the best sequel to a movie ever conceived since the Empire Strikes Back and until The Dark Knight. Cameron made sure his characters tie up those loose ends as much as possible blowing up Cyberdyne and melting the two terminators in liquid metal at the end. This all took place before this “Internet” became a thing to the general public.

The story of Terminator should have been finished right then and there at least until the cinema gods deem it appropriate for a reboot, but no, 12 years later, we’re graced with Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, because you know…money.

Series star Arnold Schwarzenegger is about the only principle cast member to return as the T-800. No Linda Hamilton as Sarah Connor who was last seen in Terminator 2, who was ultimately written out to have her character die of cancer. We’d see a third John Connor in <strongNick Stahl who was previously played by Michael Edwards (as future Connor) and Edward Furlong (present day) in Terminator 2. The female lead was taken over by Claire Danes (Homeland) as John’s future wife, Kate Brewster, while the role of the new terminator antagonist was played by Kristanna Loken as the T-X. The film’s director was Jonathan Mostow of U-571 fame.

Since Skynet still needed to be formed to create that future so that John Connor would need to send his father, Kyle Reese (Michael Biehn) to impregnate his mother Sarah in 1984 in the events of the first film, this third film pretty much says, “Screw it. Nothing you did ever mattered, judgment day is still happening.”

So we had this unusual self-aware movie who knew it can never top its predecessor to have the new villain do essentially one thing the T-1000 could never do, create complex machines and advanced weaponry, yet it’s just a liquid metal alloy over an exoskeleton as opposed to just pure liquid metal?

Once again, the T-800 meets his fate yet again since there’s nothing left for his character to really do that hasn’t been already explored in T2 other than some slight quirks. Also just because they needed to give the T-X something to do other than just chase Connor and Brewster around for 100 percent of the movie, they need her to kill their “future lieutenants” in the war for that one percent of film time.

So as Connor and Brewster survive the nuclear fallout, we get Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles and Terminator: Salvation.

TSCC, as a Fox TV show, takes place in an alternate reality after T2 where we get the Smallville-ian take on John Connor (Thomas Dekker) as his mother this time played by Lena Headey (Game of Thrones) trains him to be the military leader’s supposed to be in the future.

Sarah’s cancer does get addressed while we’re introduced to more terminators from Cromartie (Garret Dillahunt) to Cameron Phillips (Summer Glau). Phillips is a female terminator designed the protect John and the imminent threats like Cromartie. Other characters include Kyle’s brother, Derek (Brian Austin Green) and the mysterious Catherine Weaver (Garbage’s frontwoman, Shirley Manson), who’s a T-1000.

The series ran for two seasons, but retained a cult following and made for better storytelling than T3 was.

Salvation starred Christian Bale, whose stock couldn’t have been any higher due to Christopher Nolan‘s The Dark Knight. Bale took over the role of John Connor while Bryce Dallas Howard took over the role of Brewster. Schwarzenegger would make a CGI cameo near the film’s climactic scene. Sam Worthington played the mysterious Marcus Wright, whose cyborg origins were spoiled during the film’s promotional trailers. Alton Yelchin (Star Trek [2009]) was cast as a young Kyle Reese. Helena Bonham Carter would essentially become the “Borg Queen” rather Dr. Serena Kogan, who would later become the image and voice of Skynet.

The film takes place after the events of the third film. Connor’s not exactly working his way up through the human resistance as he’s trying to realize the destiny he was meant to have. In the film’s conclusion, he finally “dies,” but Wright’s proto-terminator self-conscious-retained body allows himself to be a live donor so Connor can live. To get you worked up on nostalgia, they had Hamilton record an audio cameo which Sarah’s son listens to her past recordings and they fired up the Guns N’ Roses’ 1991 hit, “You Could Be Mine,” which was originally used to help promote T2. In Salvation, Connor took out a moto-terminator to ride to Skynet’s base to the song.

McG directed Salvation to less-than-stellar reviews. The Terminator scored 100 percent on Rotten Tomatoes on aggregate scores across media outlets, T2 had 92 percent and T3 had 70 percent. Salvation scored 33 percent.

Suffice it to say, the destiny of the franchise being completely removed from present day settings fell really short of expectations.

Fast forward to 2015 and we have yet another Terminator movie in the form of Genisys with Alan Taylor (Thor: The Dark World) taking over as director. This time everything you knew about the franchise goes out the window as Sarah, is far removed now from the timid waitress we met in the 1984 film.

The new 1984 Sarah is as hardened, if not more so than she was in the events of T2, this time played by fellow Game of Thrones actress Emilia Clarke. Jai Courtney takes over the Biehn role of Kyle Reese. Schwarzenegger is back as the Terminator again without the CGI reverse aging and body double this time. Byung-hun Lee (G.I. Joe) is the new T-1000. Despite Robert Patrick‘s refusal to reprise his character from T2 due to hip issues, don’t be surprised if he ends up having a cameo.

The premise of this film now is that we’re back in the future where John Connor, this time played by Jason Clarke (Dawn of the Planet of the Apes)sends Reese back to 1984 to protect Sarah from the T-800 to follow along the events of the first film.

Reese steals his clothes and Nike shoes while being pursued by “police.” During the chase, a truck comes in barreling in on the officer and a familiar face arises, “Come with me if you want to live!” One of the signature lines from the films as she shoots twice into the officer’s T-1000 face. “Now, soldier!” another line referencing the 1984 film when Sarah was trying to an injured Reese to move.

So while we explore the new universe where not everything’s as it seems, Sarah updates Reese on his new mission given that her surrogate father, a T-800 sent back to protect her when she was a child, already took care of the T-800 originally sent to kill her in 1984.

The first trailer established that the main characters in Connor, Reese and T-800 are trying to make the events of T2 that happened in 1991, happen in 1984 by stopping Skynet, which I’m guessing they’ll somehow explain in Genisys since Skynet sort of happened primarily due to the research of Cyberdyne and the military, whose work is based on the inoperative T-800 they found at the conclusion of the first film set in 1984. Confused, yet?

Now the latest twist, which I’m guessing “completes” the work Skynet was trying to do rather than destroying humanity, assimilate them like the Borg of Star Trek. Speaking of Star Trek, the plot to Genisys is far more confusing that the 2009 film will ever be. We now find future John “reuniting” with his mother in new 1984, but something is not right.

So that asks some new questions.

What exactly did they transfer from Wright over to John at the conclusion of Salvation? If Skynet wanted to kill Connor all this time, why capture him just to send him back? Did Skynet assimilate John and finished the work they had originally with Wright? Does Skynet have a new terminator with new abilities and just chose to mimic John? Is this all John’s free will?

For me, I just like to think T2 or in the very least TSCC was a good enough conclusion for me. I didn’t care for T3 much and Salvation was a huge disappointment. I think I can treat Genisys as a standalone and with minimal expectations, like the new Robocop was. It’s not really fair to since they’re byproducts of their eras. It’s more rare to have an R-rated film to appeal enough to the masses, which is creatively unfortunate and more on the studios than anything.

Terminator: Genisys comes out July 1.