The Terminator franchise has seen its twists and turns over the years. From the explosive first entry of the series, The Terminator in 1984 to arguably one of the greatest sequels of all time in Terminator 2: Judgment Day, to the reopening, continuation and change of the timeline within the series in Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines to the first war based entry in the franchise in Terminator Salvation.
This is the first Terminator film in 6 years and Arnold Schwarzenegger’s first appearance as the T-800 in 12 years (not including Schwarzenegger having his likeness rendered onto a younger actor for Terminator Salvation). So what does this new entry have to offer not only the hardcore fans of the series but bring in a fresh audience? The answer apparently is a reboot.
Now over the past 15 years, we’ve seen many reboots that have either been successful critically or at the box-office such as Batman Begins (2005), Star Trek (2009), Robocop (2014), Man of Steel (2013) and most recently, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2014), all of which have been successful critically, financially or both. Does this film have the ability and tools to continue this reopened series and make it as popular as it was in 1984 and 1991?
With Schwarzenegger returning to his most iconic role, portraying an aging Terminator, which is explained within the film that due to the organic material that covers a Terminator’s metal endo-skeleton, it is capable of aging to maintain his undercover nature and ‘blend in’. Casting a new and younger cast as Sarah Connor, John Connor and Kyle Reese seemed like a good idea as well, but with the fact that Jai Courtney was cast as Kyle Reese and Jason Clarke as the hero of the Human Resistance, John Connor, to me, seems like a big miscast.
The story starts in 1997 with Skynet, a computer system with Artificial Intelligence that was created by Humans that learnt at a geo-metric rate. It begins executing its plan to exterminate the Human race by launching Nuclear weapons all over the globe and killing over 3 billion people in the event that would become known as Judgment Day to the Human survivors. In the post-apocalyptic world, Humans are forced to work in camps for the machines, until one man, John Connor (Jason Clarke) stands up against the machines and leads the Human Resistance in a war that lasts for years.
Being followed by his closest friend, Kyle Reese (Jai Courtney) as they battle the machines, John devises a plan to end the war once and for all, to attack a Skynet camp, which is a front for a secret base, which has built the machine that makes time travel possible. The Humans succeed in their attempt and defeat the machines, setting humans free from the shackles of tyranny and reclaiming the world they lost on August 29th 1997. Before the battle was won though, the machines sent a Terminator back in time to May 12th 1984 to kill Sarah Connor (Emilia Clarke), the mother of the Human Resistance, John Connor.
Kyle volunteers to go back in time to save Sarah and as he enters the machines, he sees a soldier, Alex (Matt Smith), attack John Connor, but Kyle disappears and sent to 1984 and sees images from a life, he never lead about a new system called Genisys. A T-800 arrives in 1984 and begins his search. He comes across a group of punks and demands their clothes, but is interrupted by a man; an older T-800 (Arnold Schwarzenegger) and they fight. The evil T-800 is shot dead by Sarah Connor with a large sniper rifle.
Reese arrives in 1984 and begins his search, but whilst searching, he comes across a T-1000 Terminator (Byung-hun Lee). Reese tries to escape but gets rescued by Sarah Connor, who shoots the T-1000 and shouts “Come with me if you want to live! Now soldier!” Reese escapes with Sarah and the Guardian Terminator where Sarah explains that everything has changed and the timeline he was sent to, no longer exists and that they are now Humanity’s last hope.
As mentioned above, this film is a reboot and follows in the same vein in creating an alternate universe like Star Trek did in 2009. Unlike Star Trek though, that not only maintained its rich history but utilises it in great fashion, this film utilises only moments from The Terminator before it completely retcons the history of the Terminator universe to create a brand new series of events. In order to do this, it attempts to mesh together events from the ‘original’ timeline with the plot and events of this ‘alternate’ timeline, to no avail though, it just doesn’t work.
The return of Schwarzenegger is a welcome return in my opinion. It’s his most iconic role and with him playing an aged Terminator makes it plausible for him to play the T-800. It may not be his greatest performance, due to the silly comic moments they attempt to bring into the film, but when we see a more Human side to the machine, it makes it worth a watch. The role of Kyle Reese and John Connor as I mentioned above was miscast.
Jason Clarke did not excel whatsoever and his best performance in the film was his speech before the Humans attacked the Machines. Other than that, his performance was nothing special. It was bland and did not show any difference in the Human John Connor to the Terminator John Connor. Jai Courtney as Reese was terrible, simply terrible. Where was the intensity of the man trapped in the wrong time? Where is the anger, hatred and the fact that he can’t trust the Terminator? He trusted him too quickly. Where was the soldier? All I saw was a bunch of smart mouth comments that did not befit the character. So there’s nothing more to say on that front.
And what was the point of J.K. Simmons character? None whatsoever. I understand that he was the ONLY link between 1984 and the present day, but he served no purpose besides to offer poor jokes and be the subject of jokes. It’s sad to see a talented actor, who recently won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for Whiplash (2014) be used for such a pointless role that served no real purpose to the plot.
The action sequences in the film as always were impressive, but it can’t carry a film, unless it’s a Michael Bay film, but that’s a different story and example. It follows the cat and mouse formula of the first, second and third entries of the series, but misses the mark with its confusing plot points and retconning the history of the series. Kudos does have to go the filmmakers for recreating the scenes from The Terminator in 1984 and subtle references to that film. It was a pleasant surprise and very welcome to see.
Overall, even though it is not the greatest film ever, I do give it 5 out of 10, mainly for effort and the references to The Terminator. It has been a while since the Terminator has hit the silver screen and has somewhat lost its appeal due to the fact that the series has been watered down to appeal to a wider audience and moved away from its gritty, neo noir, action epic.
In my opinion, the series ended with Terminator 2: Judgment Day as it was the perfect sequel and ended the story and battle against the Machines in a perfect manner, with Terminator 3 being a good stand-alone film, but terrible in comparison and Salvation just being an enjoyable war film. Terminator 3, Salvation and Genisys can’t compete with The Terminator and Terminator 2: Judgment Day.
The Filmmakers Factory 