Terminator 5/Terminator: Genisys, opening July 1, 2015

[Mommar]

That was the only redeeming plot point of the whole movie.

To be honest, at that point the entire look of Judgement Day should have changed. There's no way a device that relies on being matrixed across the planet is going to start irradiating large portions of it. That will ruin, at the very least, the fiber interconnecting it's own brain across the continents, and radiation tends to do very bad things to basic electrical components in general even when heavily shielded for space use (part of the reason why every portion of a spacecraft is done in triplicate.) LA likely would have still been in ruins but far less so as keeping the infrastructure of the world intact would have been preeminent to Skynet's survival.

[Gakken85]

That was the only redeeming plot point of the whole movie.

But T3's whole plot that Judgement Day will come no matter what feels like a semi-fixed flux point. It's going to happen but the details could change as to how it happens. Which means whatever happens in these movies where they are time traveling are meaningless.

Yes, its the only movie with bad computer jargon. The redeeming plot points are the struggles that Conner and Kate have to go through to become who they were fated to become. Getting hung up on tech specs and computer nerd details isn't really interesting for the larger movie going public.

Movies update their description of technology as pop cultural understanding allows. Just like we change our concepts of time travel as science updates our knowledge. Most people know what an array is now, but even so T3 was a long time ago. 2003. It's been more than a decade. Think how much technology has changed.

It's not meaningless, its just the nature of time travel and parallel universes.

Change causes new offshoots and realities.

You still have to fight for the survival of the human race, if it's in reality A, or reality B.

And the machines still want to protect themselves if it's in Reality Z or reality X.

It's a point that's clearly illustrated in the Robocop vs Terminator comic. Small things would be different and it's possible that a loved one might not know you the same way, but the struggle is the same.

If anything it makes it more significant because it's a struggle for a future and a race you may not personally know, but have to struggle for anyway. Again, sacrifice and fate.

To be honest, at that point the entire look of Judgement Day should have changed. There's no way a device that relies on being matrixed across the planet is going to start irradiating large portions of it. That will ruin, at the very least, the fiber interconnecting it's own brain across the continents, and radiation tends to do very bad things to basic electrical components in general even when heavily shielded for space use (part of the reason why every portion of a spacecraft is done in triplicate.) LA likely would have still been in ruins but far less so as keeping the infrastructure of the world intact would have been preeminent to Skynet's survival.

Skynet can make anything it needs to maintain itself, if it can make terminators, HKs, ect. Repair bots would be a no-brainer.

And they wouldn't be bothered by radiation.

I don't think infrastructure would matter at all except factories for production and housing their communication and data/servers. They could set those up away from major human population centers.

Edited December 5, 2014 by Gakken85

[Mommar]

Skynet can make anything it needs to maintain itself, if it can make terminators, HKs, ect. Repair bots would be a no-brainer.

And they wouldn't be bothered by radiation.

I don't think infrastructure would matter at all except factories for production and housing their communication and data/servers. They could set those up away from major human population centers.

You obviously don't understand how Skynet worked at the end of T3, or how radiation affects electronics.

[Black Valkyrie]

T1 & T2 was enough for me but with this new movie as for the sound track, I hope they put some 80s music style in it.

[Gubaba]

I say real fans because I think these themes should be clear to people who like the first movie, and I saw 3 as an attempt to reestablish that.

OK, so a "real" Terminator fan is you and anyone who agrees with you. Gotcha.

Given that, I guess you're right... the only people looking forward to this new movie are the "real fans."

Edited December 5, 2014 by Gubaba

[technoblue]

They were slasher horror films. That's all there is to it.

Predator. Alien. Terminator. Robocop even, to a lesser degree. They all got their start with a shoe string budget and all the elements of the horror genre of the 80s. The sci-if stuff was added to it, the terminology and the settings changed, but it was still a force of nature destroying obstacles. The rules were a little different as the hero's had a chance to win, but that's all you need to make it work. In other words make it dark and make it a struggle for somebody.

Sci-fi Horror and Straight-up Horror do share certain themes (the chase, the adrenaline), but I find it difficult to put them in the same category. IMO, I would also say that the original movies in your selection were all better than the sequels that came later. Even though I enjoyed Aliens and Predator 2, for example, I prefer to rewatch Alien and Predator today.

Calling out Alien specifically, it cost $11 million in 1979. It think that's the same budget George Lucas had for Star Wars two years earlier. For the 1970s that's a little more than a shoestring financial account. Both movies were financial risks but Alien was more Sci-fi Horror and Star Wars was more Sci-fi Fantasy.

It does sometimes feel like Hollywood isn't risking as much today as it once did, but that could be my own mistaken impression. I do think it is interesting how Ridley Scott was unable to pump life back into the Alien universe with Prometheus. It just shows that Cameron may have been wiser by walking away from that kind of nostalgia.

[Gubaba]

Sci-fi Horror and Straight-up Horror do share certain themes (the chase, the adrenaline), but I find it difficult to put them in the same category. IMO, I would also say that the original movies in your selection were all better than the sequels that came later. Even though I enjoyed Aliens and Predator 2, for example, I prefer to rewatch Alien and Predator today.

Gakken85 is absolutely right, I think, in the idea that T1 and Alien, at least, are horror movies. T1 has more of a blending of action-movie in it, but Alien certainly has the same template as a slasher flick, except it's adults on a spaceship instead of teenagers at a camp (or wherever) and an alien instead of a deranged murderer.

Of course, those changes give Alien a wholly different tone and set of concerns than your typical '80s slasher, but the basic plot is there.

[technoblue]

Gakken85 is absolutely right, I think, in the idea that T1 and Alien, at least, are horror movies. T1 has more of a blending of action-movie in it, but Alien certainly has the same template as a slasher flick, except it's adults on a spaceship instead of teenagers at a camp (or wherever) and an alien instead of a deranged murderer.

Of course, those changes give Alien a wholly different tone and set of concerns than your typical '80s slasher, but the basic plot is there.

If you deconstruct it that far, Gubaba, then I don't have a leg to stand on. Both movie types have an actor playing a pop-up monster and a group of characters trying to survive.

[Gubaba]

If you deconstruct it that far, Gubaba, then I don't have a leg to stand on. Both movie types have an actor playing a pop-up monster and a group of characters trying to survive.

I don't think it's deconstructing it to say that the plot of Alien is "monster kills spaceship crew one-by-one as they try to fight back."

Edited December 5, 2014 by Gubaba

[Knight26]

One of the reasons that certain sequels work is they either continue a story down a well laid out path or attempt to tell a wholly different story in the same universe as the first.

Go to the Alien example:

Alien was a sci-fi survival horror with great mood, pacing and an ambiance that still makes me jump sometimes.

Aliens was an action flick in the same universe and upped the ante by making it an army verses an army.

Both of these worked great.

Alien 3 tried to rehash the original Alien but with prisoners fighting a single alien again, and honestly, it didn't work.

Alien R was just an unholy mess that even Whedon couldn't save and in a lot of ways became a parody of itself.

In the Terminator franchise:

T1 was again a sci-fi survival tale, man vs super advanced cyborg, with an emphasis on action rather than suspense.

Crud need to go will finish later.

[Gakken85]

They aren't horror films. Not saying that - but they use the template and expound upon it. Horror in the 80's was basically indie movie making. Like Predator for example. You don't show the killer until the end. You kill them off one at a time with a little gore. The only difference was it was in a jungle and Arnold fought back as a believable hero. Horror films are more about dealing with terror you can't control, where the Sci-fi elements offer a lot more space to impact the story. Hero's can fight back because they have big guns and space suits, though the enemy is also more fantastic.

Sci-fi movies int he last few years have forgotten that it needs to be a little dark and scary to impart some gravity to the fantastic elements. I don't think it's that far of a deconstruction. Predators almost had it right... they use a Torture Porn kind of idea, but it just fell apart and had a shitty lead actor.

Technoblue, I think it just comes down to budget. When you have less you work harder. Like with prometheus - they expected the graphics and sets to tell the story when there wasn't much story to tell. In the first Terminator, Cameron and Arnold would sneak out in the early morning to break a car window since it was illegal to do without certain permits. They wanted to get it made well and they did what they had to do to make it happen instead of relying on IT guys and Designers to submit computer generated mush.

Maybe it's an ego thing, but less is usually a lot more.

Edited December 5, 2014 by Gakken85

[technoblue]

They aren't horror films. Not saying that - but they use the template and expound upon it. Horror in the 80's was basically indie movie making. Like Predator for example. You don't show the killer until the end. You kill them off one at a time with a little gore. The only difference was it was in a jungle and Arnold fought back as a believable hero. Horror films are more about dealing with terror you can't control, where the Sci-fi elements offer a lot more space to impact the story. Hero's can fight back because they have big guns and space suits, though the enemy is also more fantastic.

Sci-fi movies int he last few years have forgotten that it needs to be a little dark and scary to impart some gravity to the fantastic elements. I don't think it's that far of a deconstruction. Predators almost had it right... they use a Torture Porn kind of idea, but it just fell apart and had a shitty lead actor.

Yeah. I see what you mean. And if I may bandwagon Knight26's idea, I also like those stories that do a good job of expanding their worlds/universes. If Genysis can take Terminator in a new direction, do something more than simply changing the roles of the major characters from the previous films, then it should be fun. I guess part of me is hooked already. If the movie is good, then I wouldn't want to miss it for being too critical either.

Technoblue, I think it just comes down to budget. When you have less you work harder. Like with prometheus - they expected the graphics and sets to tell the story when there wasn't much story to tell. In the first Terminator, Cameron and Arnold would sneak out in the early morning to break a car window since it was illegal to do without certain permits. They wanted to get it made well and they did what they had to do to make it happen instead of relying on IT guys and Designers to submit computer generated mush.

I agree. And that goes for budget or ability. At least, I find that having a goal that goes above what I think I can achieve drives me to complete it or to do my best to fail at it spectacularly.

[taksraven]

the preachy BS he stuffed down our throats in Avatar. .

Hmmmm. So it's ok for colonial powers to trample/subjugate/destroy indigenous cultures then?

[sketchley]

I agree. And that goes for budget or ability. At least, I find that having a goal that goes above what I think I can achieve drives me to complete it or to do my best to fail at it spectacularly.

Speaking of budgets - the ones these days allow them to go with their first ideas, which generally aren't that good. When the budgets are small (and the access to CG is limited) and they have to rethink their initial ideas - that is when the good stuff tends to appear.

[Duke Togo]

Hmmmm. So it's ok for colonial powers to trample/subjugate/destroy indigenous cultures then?

Right, because that's exactly what I was trying to say. Everyone missed it but you. Secretly, I'm a xenophobic imperialist. But now you've unmasked me.

You have anything else brilliant to add to the discussion, dear?

[Hikuro]

hey I actually did remember a complaint I had! When the DVD remaster came out of T1, they completely changed the audio track for the 5.1 stereo. Everything sounds horrible now and tends to ruin the film for me. sound makes everything, not just visuals.

[areaseven]

[JB0]

That was the only redeeming plot point of the whole movie.

But T3's whole plot that Judgement Day will come no matter what feels like a semi-fixed flux point. It's going to happen but the details could change as to how it happens. Which means whatever happens in these movies where they are time traveling are meaningless.

Well, that's kind of calling back to the first movie. Judgement Day will happen. Humanity will eventually win, but at great cost. There's no way to change this.

The "self-correcting" future is a way to reconcile that original concept with the fact that Judgement Day DIDN'T happen, and they kinda blew up the company's entire R&D department.

Which isn't to say it was a great movie, but it was at least marginally considering some of the original film's themes.

Also, in terms of science fiction, the Terminatrix makes a lot more sense than the T-1000.

Yupyup. I still dislike the T1000, even after having made my peace with his film. I think liquid metal over robot makes more sense than liquid metal over more liquid metal.

But neither one should be able to time-travel, since they aren't organic.

The T-1000 in 2 makes no damned sense, unless Cameron is claiming that every individual atom of that machine has the same sentience and control as every other piece. Otherwise when its destroyed or broken up it would have no ability to reform or act on it's on. It would have to have some kind of robot core beyond nano-technology that was never even hinted at in the film or the books even for the future level of technology.

There could be a low-level "instinctive" routine in each individual node to search for other nearby nodes to combine with until the system is large enough for something resembling intelligence. A distributed computer... much like Skynet is in Terminator 3.

I'm willing to grant some of it's more egregious flaws, like suffering system failure in an environment humans operate in, as it being identified as a prototype. Skynet was desperate and sent a machine that wasn't really ready for prime time back.

But no, it doesn't make an awful lot of sense.

Nobody ever questions it, but it just shows how flat Cameron's ideas are when he isn't using other peoples concepts. He thought a liquid robot would be cool looking, and it was at the time, but it makes no sense that it would reconstitute itself or be able to function with giant losses of it mass.

It pisses me off to no end.

There's a lot of issues with 2 if you watch it critically. It feels to me like they were just throwing every idea into the script without considering how they meshed together.

And then in the final scene, the T1000 tries to force Sarah to call John to her so he can kill John.

Despite the fact that the T1000 can imitate Sarah and do it himself, which he does in the next scene after forgetting to kill Sarah.

Were I trying to defend the film, I'd argue the heat was messing with his systems in more than the obvious "difficulty keeping form" issue, and he wasn't thinking properly. But... it'd be a weak defense.

Yes, its the only movie with bad computer jargon.

I yell at a lot of films for bad computers. This one was exceptionally bad with computers, though.

Getting hung up on tech specs and computer nerd details isn't really interesting for the larger movie going public.

As the public becomes more familiar with computers, movies should strive for MORE accurate portrayals, not LESS.

And, well... I AM a computer nerd. An error on such a massive scale is HIGHLY distracting.

(I'm also not sure how the virus got into the wild, with Skynet being disconnected from the network)

Skynet can make anything it needs to maintain itself, if it can make terminators, HKs, ect. Repair bots would be a no-brainer.

And they wouldn't be bothered by radiation.

I don't think infrastructure would matter at all except factories for production and housing their communication and data/servers. They could set those up away from major human population centers.

As a distributed system, every cellphone and broadcast tower T3-Skynet destroyed made it dumber, every routing server and fiber-optic backbone reduced to ionized particles in the air a potentially crippling blow(or even worse, resulted in MULTIPLE DIFFERENT SKYNETS placed at odds with each other).

It was in it's interests, short-term at least, to keep infrastructure damage to a controlled level, something nuclear carpet-bombing is not very good at.

And yes, it would be bothered by radiation. There's a reason NASA uses decade-old processors and pays through the nose for custom versions of them.

Radiation does TERRIBLE things to integrated circuits, and the more advanced they are, the more sensitive they are. So the most powerful nodes of T3-Skynet were also the most at risk on Judgement Day.

So the initial strike on humanity would have to be executed very carefully to prevent Skynet lobotomizing itself in the process.

[Mr March]

I was fairly certain that like all Terminators, the T1000 needed some time with the "subject being copied" to record enough speech such that the victim's voice would be convincingly reproduceable.

[JB0]

I was fairly certain that like all Terminators, the T1000 needed some time with the "subject being copied" to record enough speech such that the victim's voice would be convincingly reproduceable.

Doesn't change the fact that he DOES copy Sarah Conner later, after leaving her alive so they can do a scene where John is faced with two Sarahs both shouting at him in identical voices. He literally had her pinned to a wall. He could've decapitated her or lanced her heart before he walked off, and then he would've won because John wouldn't have had two Sarahs both shouting "shoot her, she's the robot" at him.

...

And I was under the impression he could copy someone perfectly from as little as a single footprint. Which made no sense whatsoever, but...

[Mr March]

THat's what I'm saying; he can't kill her right away because he has to spend at least some time listening to Sarah talk so he can imitate her speech. Kill her before she gets a word out and how is he supposed to mimic her? They do state the T1000 can imitate anything it touches (though it's not elaborated "how"), but again...I would think a physical copy wouldn't mean a mental/vocal/memory copy of course. So some vocal sampling would be required. THat's how I've always interpreted it.

[Gakken85]

I'm glad I'm not the only one who hates the t1000 haha

[JB0]

THat's what I'm saying; he can't kill her right away because he has to spend at least some time listening to Sarah talk so he can imitate her speech. Kill her before she gets a word out and how is he supposed to mimic her? They do state the T1000 can imitate anything it touches (though it's not elaborated "how"), but again...I would think a physical copy wouldn't mean a mental/vocal/memory copy of course. So some vocal sampling would be required. That's how I've always interpreted it.

Welllllllll... they'd argued for a bit right before he left her. I can't swear which one calls to John first, but I want to say it's the Terminator.

ANYWAYS... I just watched Salvation for the first time ever. It's... not a good movie.

And as with Genesys, it suffers from the trailer spoiling the big twist. I already knew our hero was a robot from seeing the trailers, so the DRAMATIC UNVEIL was totally lost on me, and all the camerawork carefully hiding his exposed mechanics before the secret was out was... well, kind of silly.

YouTube tells me this was also a problem with Terminator 2's trailers(which I have no recollection of ever seeing) as well, so... whatever. All trailers are spoilers, Soylent Green is people, and Darth Vader is Luke's father.

I did smile when they messed with expectations in Salvation, trying to kill the final boss by dumping molten steel on it. It looks like it's melted down, everything is finished... and then it rises out of the big glob of red-hot steel on the floor and resumes stalking. THAT was mildly inspired, even if little else was.

[Guest davidwhangchoi]

t1000 was awesome. everytime i see metal mario on N64, i kept thinking wow mario is the T1000 and we wouldn't have Odo from deep space nine

[Gakken85]

t1000 was awesome. everytime i see metal mario on N64, i kept thinking wow mario is the T1000 and we wouldn't have Odo from deep space nine

Hahaha

[skullmilitia]

some day.. someone will make a good Terminator movie. I will be ready, that day. This day, is not that day.
Though, I have been waiting since T1. T2 was a pop corn flick, but had more money then heart. T3 was just... meh

T4 was a good future war movie, about some other machines that are like terminators.. but not actually "Terminator".

T4 was a ruined the minute the second they sacrificed Marcus for Connor, so freaking stupid, I almost screamed at the screen.

Someone also needs to learn more about time paradox, multiple time lines, and the multi-verse before trying to keep

re-writing the same thing for the 5th time.

[Gubaba]

YouTube tells me this was also a problem with Terminator 2's trailers(which I have no recollection of ever seeing) as well, so... whatever.

It was, unfortunately. The notion that Arnie was playing the good guy was common knowledge, even to someone like me, who didn't follow the press on it much.

some day.. someone will make a good Terminator movie.

I think that day has passed. We already have a good Terminator movie or two, and we should be grateful for that. No need to get greedy.

Edited December 6, 2014 by Gubaba

[Agent ONE]

Hmmmm. So it's ok for colonial powers to trample/subjugate/destroy indigenous cultures then?

All DT was saying was he doesn't appreciate political messaging in entertainment. Either way. If there was a film about how the mindless subhuman indigenous were shown the light by colonial steelers, and once falling in line, became real people instead of animals, DT would be equally irritated. I agree... I do not accept being preached to.

[taksraven]

Right, because that's exactly what I was trying to say. Everyone missed it but you. Secretly, I'm a xenophobic imperialist. But now you've unmasked me.

You have anything else brilliant to add to the discussion, dear?

Um, yeah Duke. You....clearly....showed....me....up. Whatever.

The thing that got to me about Avatar was its blatant theft of concepts from Lawrence of Arabia. But, if you gotta steal, steal from the best I guess.

All DT was saying was he doesn't appreciate political messaging in entertainment. Either way. If there was a film about how the mindless subhuman indigenous were shown the light by colonial steelers, and once falling in line, became real people instead of animals, DT would be equally irritated. I agree... I do not accept being preached to.

The subtle political subtexts in Interstellar must have had you guys running from the cinema screaming........

[Duke Togo]

All DT was saying was he doesn't appreciate political messaging in entertainment. Either way. If there was a film about how the mindless subhuman indigenous were shown the light by colonial steelers, and once falling in line, became real people instead of animals, DT would be equally irritated. I agree... I do not accept being preached to.

Actually, it's not the use of entertainment media to convey a message that bothers me; it's the unintelligent, cartoonish, cliched, and heavy handed use of entertainment media to convey a message that annoys the hell out of me and turns me off.

[sketchley]

YouTube tells me this was also a problem with Terminator 2's trailers(which I have no recollection of ever seeing) as well, so...

Don't remember seeing a trailer for it, but I remember Arnold promoting it on the Arsenio Hall Show and he straight out said that he was a good guy in the movie. So, we can't just blame the trailers for spoiling things...

[Hikuro]

yeah even I knew at the age of 8 that he was going to be a good guy. I was in line with my mom and there was a guy behind us saying "So first one he's a bad guy, second one he's a good guy then if they make a third he's bad again OR the Van Damme him and he's both good guy and a bad guy" My brain exploded.

For me, the best trailer I've ever seen Terminator related or ANYTHING was this one back in the 90's https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mKtWhBtvHQU and nothing could ever top that for my childhood. It scared me and thrilled me.

[Dobber]

Don't remember seeing a trailer for it, but I remember Arnold promoting it on the Arsenio Hall Show and he straight out said that he was a good guy in the movie. So, we can't just blame the trailers for spoiling things...

I think I remember that too. Was that the interview when he called himself the SPERMINATER and then said "I come again"

No joke he really said that. Laughed my ass off when he did!

Chris

[Hikuro]

I think I remember that too. Was that the interview when he called himself the SPERMINATER and then said "I come again"

No joke he really said that. Laughed my ass off when he did!

Chris

No I think he said that bit when he was running for govenator.

[Agent ONE]

Um, yeah Duke. You....clearly....showed....me....up. Whatever.

The thing that got to me about Avatar was its blatant theft of concepts from Lawrence of Arabia. But, if you gotta steal, steal from the best I guess.

The subtle political subtexts in Interstellar must have had you guys running from the cinema screaming........

No, I thought Interstellar was actually balanced. The liberal message of the Polpot style anti-technology and education in favor of providing for the people, was one message, contrasted with the conservative 'technology saves lives' conversation was interesting in a world where we are most certainly are living in a way that not sustainable. (this is a fact, not a political opinion) It was good.