Terminator Salvation (2009)

Directed by: McG
Written by: John D Brancato/Michael Ferris
Based on characters created by: James Cameron/Gale Anne Hurd

Before the terminators show up, I wanna hit some previews.

BRUNO–I’m so there. If any industry deserves the Sascha Baron Cohen treatment, it’s the fashion industry. And it looks like he’s going to go even further than he did in Borat. This makes me happy

TRANSORMERS: REVENGE OF THE FALLEN–Sigh. Megan Fox is super-hot, but the robots still look like broken glass (thank you, Bart, for that imagery) and this movie is still going to stink on ice. In fact, it’s going to be WAY worse than the first because it looks like John Turturro’s inane character is going to be in it even more. Love the guy, but this character is a waste of his talent. I might see this for free. Fuck Michael Bay.

Oh yeah, and “The Fallen” is the name of a robot. Again: fuck Michael Bay.

SURROGATES–Bruce Willis stars in a cross between Total Recall and Minority Report with some Matrix thrown in for good measure. In the future, everyone can live their life anyway they want to because they’re actually enclosed in a tube that projects them into the “real” world using surrogates. There hasn’t been a murder in decades because there are no real people on the streets…until now. Someone is somehow killing people through their surrogates and Bruce has to come out of his dream state to find the murderer.

It’s kinda cool/creepy to see Bruce look like he did back in his Moonlighting days, but I’m not so sure that can carry a movie. I guess we’ll see, but I’m not too hopeful. Plus, is this the first Touchstone movie in about two decades? What’s up with that?

Ok, let’s get to some robots that actually look real.

In 1984, James Cameron did something that no one thought he would do. He came back from making Piranha 2: The Spawning. Not only did he come back from that, he made a movie that is still considered a classic of sci-fi/horror, even with the big hair and huge lady pants.

Then, in 1992, he did it again. Sure, it’s not quite as good and ends on such a sunny note that it’s almost sickening, but it’s still a damn fine movie and a pretty decent follow-up to the classic original.

Some say that Jonathan Mostow ruined the series with the third film in 2003, but I beg to differ. I think that, all the jokey stuff aside (Arnold in Elton John sunglasses?), the movie took the series back to the darkness that the original promised. And it sets everything back on course after the second said, “Oop! Nevermind! There’s no apocalypse!” Rise Of The Machines basically says, “You can’t stop fate, motherfucker.”

So, where does that leave McG’s new installment? I mean, not only is he showing us the money shot of the whole series (the actual war with the robots), but he has Christian Fucking Bale as series hero, John Conner!

Well, here’s my first problem: I never wanted to see the robot wars. To me, the series was all about the lead up. The war itself was kind of a McGuffin. I cared about John and his mother, not the actual robots. When the third film ended, I thought, “Awesome! The wars still happen, but they cut it off at just the right point. Series end!”

Apparently, I was in the minority. Every other Terminator fan had to have it all spelled out for them. Well, let me just say this: This is what you get.

John Conner (Bale) is working his way up the ranks of the resistance. He knows his future and his past and he knows what he has to do to make the resistance, and himself, survive. But he sure does have his work cut out for him.

Marcus Wright (Sam Worthington) is an ex-con from the 2009 who, somehow, ends up fighting alongside John. Is he a good guy? Or is he somehow working for Skynet? (If you pay any attention at all, you know the answer to this pretty early on.)

Oh yeah, and Chekov, I mean, Kyle Reese (Anton Yelchin) is also running from the robots. In fact, he’s above John on their hitlist.

I really wish this movie had been better. Actually, no. Fuck that. I wish it had been GOOD. As it is, it was an almost fun action movie that seems to have been made by someone who didn’t watch the first three movies very closely. I didn’t even think about all of the inconsistencies until I watched my buddy’s podcast at Geekscape and his co-host pointed out that a) Skynet should not know who the fuck Kyle is and b) a certain cameo that happens should not happen yet. So, yeah. McG and his writers (Michael Ferris and John Brancato, who also wrote the third film) apparently didn’t care all that much about the series.

Oh, wait! Ferris and Brancato also wrote The Net! THAT explains EVERYTHING!

There was good stuff in the movie. The action was pretty good. And Christian was great. Marcus was a really cool character who, unfortunately, didn’t get to do very much except brood a bit and be stuck in an incredibly unbelievable romance with the amazingly hot Moon Bloodgood. And Anton was pretty good as Reese.

But none of that added up to nearly enough to carry a movie. And the end was very nearly ludicrous.

McG has two more movies planned for the series. I might give a second one a shot, but I’ll do it begrudgingly. McG’s no Michael Bay, but I can see him getting there if he keeps up like this. <shudder>